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SoW Reddog
Dec-30-2013, 18:30
I'm about to start working on a new mission. The idea on this is to have a shorter duration mission, say 3hrs. Blue targets are 'live' one (random) at a time, rather than a free for all. Reds won't know which specific target is live, but will know all possible targets. The mission will be persistent in the sense that a target destroyed in one iteration of the mission will still be dead in the next. If blues succeed in killing all targets the mission will reset itself next time.

Targets across the map, but split into East and West. If the target is in the east, then the spawns are relevant to that area, so no spawning in manston to defend Southampton for example.

Targets will be a mix of traditional destroy buildings/units, ships, airfield bomb weight types and destroy x number of planes. Reds can have targets too, maybe allowing them to knock out blue airbases as well?

What do you think?

Kling
Dec-30-2013, 18:55
Sounds very interesting Reddog and I know you have the knowhow!!

Any chance of being able to implent an encouraged RTB in order to help your side win the map(something like RTBing will give your side extra points towards winning the map or something) as I believe that the RR function will work again with patch 4.01? ;)

Would be so great if people would be encouraged to land their aircraft and feel a purpose to do it ;)
Anyway I didnt want to go off topic..
Your mission idea sounds really good!!

SoW Reddog
Dec-30-2013, 19:01
Oh yeah, sorry I forgot, aircraft limits...

Bear Pilot
Dec-30-2013, 19:07
Sounds like a good idea to me! :thumbsup:

9./JG52_J-HAT
Dec-30-2013, 19:16
Hey Reddog,

I like it. It is like what I, Lolsav and others have posted. Very nice.

About reds being able to disable blue airfields, what would be the goal of that? I mean, when attackers disable airfields from the defenders near the target area, it is obvious why, but the other way around?
I think one reason would be to "force" blues from coming from just one area. For example, current target is Hastings, there are blue airfields east of the target area and west. If the ones on the east get knocked out, the blues will always be coming from the western side. But if you as red don't know what the current target is, how would you know?
Maybe to make some plane types not avaliable anymore? For example, bomb the 109 jabo airfields and only heavy bombers are left? Maybe even making, for example, Ju 88 airfields destroyable, but leaving the He 111s, depending on target type?

About the target not being known for the defenders (I don't know how many targets there would be), maybe you could say the three targets out of 8 that are possible, so reds don't get scattered all over? Maybe by target type? Say, three building types, three ship types, three armor types etc and you just say " target now is an armored column", but don't say which?
When the number of targets left gets lower, there is no way around it, it will be fun attacking the last ones left with heavy defences.

Looking forward to it and thanks again for your nice missions, Reddog!

EG14_Marcast
Dec-30-2013, 21:42
It looks nice, go ahead :thumbsup:

9./JG52_Meyer
Dec-31-2013, 04:31
Sounds very interesting Reddog and I know you have the knowhow!!

Any chance of being able to implent an encouraged RTB in order to help your side win the map(something like RTBing will give your side extra points towards winning the map or something) as I believe that the RR function will work again with patch 4.01? ;)

Would be so great if people would be encouraged to land their aircraft and feel a purpose to do it ;)
Anyway I didnt want to go off topic..
Your mission idea sounds really good!!

Can it be implemented that you can only land at a home base to get the points? ,there is a particular sqdn who like to spawn red fly to blue bases shoot them up and when they get damaged by flak or blue fighters that have got up to engage them they land at the blue bases they were attacking to get them the landed message.
Now i know it costs their team points but they dont give a s**t. This is all they do for the entire map duration . How about if anyone lands at an enemy base then they are kicked for 10 mins. There is no possible reason to land at an enemy base if you are damaged then try to fly home or bail or even land on a field somewhere. If we are trying to promote as much realism as we can then landing at an enemy base is NOT real (unless defecting of course)
The RTB proper suggestion above to encourage people to land at home AND gain their sides points is an excellent idea as is the OP for a new mission . The more missions the better

92 Sqn. Philstyle (QJ-P)
Dec-31-2013, 05:16
Can it be implemented that you can only land at a home base to get the points? r

Hi Meyer, the "net-stats" points are hard-coded into the game unfortunately. The mission makers cannot control those.
The only way to change the way the game allocates these points would be for TF to revise them at the game level. This would then affect all servers and all missions running the patch...

At the moment, from my own personal viewpoint (not a TF position), there does not appear to be consensus on how points should be allocated.
To be honest, I prefer the old IL2 system, whereby full points could only be obtained if the pilot managed to land at a friendly base. But the dogfight servers favour the current system, where ALL kills are recorded, no matter if the pilot survives or not.

The alternative to a point-based system would be some kind of handicap (time-out or some other system) for players who repeatedly do not make it home. That system would, however, penalise newer players who are more likely to get killed more often.

To be honest, if a particular squad is doing this over and over, why not call them out on it? See if they can explain themselves?
That's partly what the tags are for right? To help everyone identify groups of players who approach the game in a specific way...

9./JG52_Meyer
Dec-31-2013, 05:31
Thanks for the reply Phil , its a shame about the points thing and not being able to change it. I have asked them before what they are doing landing at a blue base and the reply i got was in broken English " Its better than being killed in game" or words to that effect.
Suppose i will have to live with it frustating though

92 Sqn. Philstyle (QJ-P)
Dec-31-2013, 05:56
I have asked them before what they are doing landing at a blue base and the reply i got was in broken English " Its better than being killed in game" or words to that effect.


To be honest, I'm sure most WW2 pilots would rather a safe landing at an enemy base rather than being killed ;)
However, there will be player who game-the-game, and repeatedly use this as an excuse for using stats-related short-cuts.

Despite that, games will never be able to re-create the fear of capture or death, versus the jubilation of returning to friendly soil. I wish they could.

Perhaps the best way is to incentivise good behaviour, rather than penalise the bad?
I'm not sure how to do this though...

Sods
Dec-31-2013, 06:17
Can it be implemented that you can only land at a home base to get the points? ,there is a particular sqdn who like to spawn red fly to blue bases shoot them up and when they get damaged by flak or blue fighters that have got up to engage them they land at the blue bases they were attacking to get them the landed message.

Hi Mayer a kills a kill. if you were flying during WWII and shot down an enemy aircraft you would be credited for that kill. if you land at an enemy base then you should be captured by the opposing team and held as a POW. but I agree there should be some sort of consequence to this action. what could be possible in game is for that player who lands on an enemy base, will be killed!!

SoW Reddog
Dec-31-2013, 06:40
Indeed, there are players on both sides who seem more interested in stats or mission success than their virtual lives. There's one particular fellow on the Blue side who likes nothing more than to bomb an airbase then land on it, despite in Homeplate this being penalised. Such behaviour is not going to be modified by a single mission or mission maker unfortunately. (unless of course that mission maker has a 9mm and the address of said player :devilish:)

The problem with what you ask is the same as every stat related suggestion. There are two sets of stats, the in game net stats which I cannot do anything about and would need TF to change the game code, and the ATAG web stats which again I can't control and IMO need rewriting. Who has the power to do that seems to be down to Colander which means its a low priority given all the other work he has on his plate.

What might start to make a difference is peer pressure from both sides when they see something daft going on. But, then it runs the risk of becoming a keyboard warrior fest.

So, in response to your question, the only thing I can do to try to help the situation is with aircraft limits. Don't get your aircraft back to a friendly base, then you lose the aircraft from your pool. Issue I can see here is that one numpty's actions can screw an entire team by wasting all their planes. I'm not sure I can prevent a specific player spawning but I will have a look.

9./JG52_Meyer
Dec-31-2013, 07:05
Thanks for the replies fellas , Reddog the problem is its not just one "Numpty" its his whole squad that do it and like i said they dont care about the consequences points wise

SoW Reddog
Dec-31-2013, 07:48
Thanks for the replies fellas , Reddog the problem is its not just one "Numpty" its his whole squad that do it and like i said they dont care about the consequences points wise

Well they can't do it on London Raids, unless they are adept at flying without any control surfaces!:thumbsup:

SoW Reddog
Dec-31-2013, 22:23
Guys, I'm at a bit of a crossroads in the logic flow of the scripting (and yes, I'm aware it's 3.20am on New Years day and I'm coding a bloody game :) - can't sleep tonight)

The targets are made up of 3 types currently;
- "Trigger" targets which work using a grounddestroyed trigger and are either RDF stations or factories/industrial targets,
- "Area" targets which are RAF stations - maybe spawn points for Reds and may not,
- "Planes" which specify a number of Red planes to be destroyed either on the ground or in the air.

My initial thought was to give the Blues one target at a time but it's occurred to me that several things might happen which could cause "issues":
1) Bomb aiming/navigation isn't always great in the heat of battle, and so the "wrong" target could get hit
2) Players ignore the brief/current mission and go off and do what they want

How do we want to handle hitting the wrong target? Do we want the Blues penalised, or it to count, or ignore it?

What I don't want to do is create a mission which is the same as others, so just letting players bomb airfields to disable spawns willy nilly is going to severely handicap the Reds given the persistent nature of the mission.

My feeling is that only the current target counts, and that if someone destroys a target prematurely then they should be penalised.

Am I on the right track here?

Secondly, and I know this is potentially divisive, how do people feel about spawning being prevented for UP to 15 minute periods? I'm thinking that this could be used as a penalty for certain things, like hitting the wrong target, or landing on an enemy airfield etc. Unfortunately I don't think it's possible to target specific "offenders" so it'd have to be for an entire team at a time. Warnings would be posted, and might make people take a bit more care or moderate their actions? - Having said that, I realise that this is a more wider reaching philosophical question for the server and community I guess?

9./JG52_J-HAT
Jan-01-2014, 11:58
Hey Reddog, nice to see your engagement :)

Conceptwise (as I don't know how to make the missions) I had thought about the wrong targets being hit and to say the thruth, couldn't find a solution that would work everytime without issues. Initially I thought about making the targets visible only when it's their turn (for example, spawn in the target building only when it's supposed to be destroyed, or the armored collumn, or infantry position and so on). But as the possible targets are known through the briefing, it would take a single sortie to each or the possible targets to find out, as a defender, which one is the current. And this wouldn't work for airfields, or any area targets, unless the targets are buldings. But then again, it would look weird having buildings popping-up right next to you or in front of you while you take off. And we would have the same problem again: the current target would be obvious.
To try to circumvent the first problem (current target out of a know set of possible targets), maybe instead of describing them on the briefing, you could implement this information in the tab4 menu? Of course, after someone playing the mission doing all the targets this would be a problem again, unless there is a way of shuffling the target order and add some kind of randomness. Making many targets possible could be a way to minimize this, but it would take a way larger effort.

Another possibility would be to make the targets which are not the current one indestructable or make them respawn without any amage after being hit. Technically it could lead to weird things or even complications, though (imagine a wing of 4 planes attacking the same target with a small intervall; after each bomber destroys it, the targets would respawn...4 times within seconds).

Both options have problems. I would try to favor the first from these two. I too think only the current target counts, as if it weren't like this, there is no reason to code it the way you are wanting to.
But if a target gets destroyed which is not the right one, when that target is up, there won't be anything to hit when that specific target is up.

In ArmA II we would have this same thing (domination coop gameplay), with rotating target. Everyone would go for the current target, where there would be armor and enemy infantry to be killed. They would spawn in and out after dead and a new target was up. There were targets for every city on the map. The current target would come up as a yellow message and the briefing and map would be adjusted accordingly.

A third alternative as you say would be a penalty. But how? How do we prevent players who won't follow the briefing or the mission rules from penalizing the rest of the players? If the penalties are indeed only team wise, I think this could have very negative effects on players who want to play the mission by the rules. The not spawning for 15 minutes could lead to players just leaving and not wanting to play the mission again, as they wouldn't be able to control it and would still be penalized by not being able to play. I think such systems are nice (eg if you die you stay 15 minutes out) when there are other similar servers where you can play these 15 minutes. It is unfortunetly not the case with CoD.
And even with penalties, only common sense would stop people from destroying all targets but the current one if all of them are visible or destroyable.

I guess that's it for now. If I think of anything else I'll post again.

SoW Reddog
Jan-01-2014, 13:12
Cheers J-hat. Basically the same analysis as mine.

The missions are chosen randomly so there won't be any predicting what is going to be up next. I've put in catches for when the wrong targets are hit. Area targets aren't a problem as it just won't count the damage. Trigger type targets are more of a problem, I'll have to remove them if they're hit out of sequence. I agree they can't just re spawn.

I need to have an experiment with destroying and removing buildings and objects individually, there must be a way.

Blues will get a message about which target is current when it changes, and also be able to find out via the tab 4 menu.

ATAG_Ribbs
Jan-01-2014, 21:09
Just thinking out loud here... but would it be possible to script a resupply feature into the game? Starting simple like flying 3 resupply flights (Using a slower obsolete aircraft )from a rearward base would make a forward base that has been bombed and out of commission active again? :D

AKA_Knutsac
Jan-02-2014, 00:11
"My feeling is that only the current target counts, and that if someone destroys a target prematurely then they should be penalised."

How about that funny script used to keep Reds from crossing into France...if someone hits the wrong target, their plane just falls apart. I'd love to hear the howls!

~S~

AKA Knutsac

92 Sqn. Philstyle (QJ-P)
Jan-02-2014, 02:38
"My feeling is that only the current target counts, and that if someone destroys a target prematurely then they should be penalised."
How about that funny script used to keep Reds from crossing into France...if someone hits the wrong target, their plane just falls apart. I'd love to hear the howls!
~S~
AKA Knutsac

Not a bad idea.
OR, alternatively, if all targets had vehicles insides them (i.e. vehicles inside buildings). AND if it is the vehicles that have to be destroyed. Why not just only spawn the vehicles in, when the target is up?

That way, a premature raid will fail to take out the vehicles.

* Although a premature raid will destroy the buildings, making it difficult for subsequent mature raids to see which parts of the target need bombing...

EG14_Marcast
Jan-02-2014, 03:33
.......Reds won't know which specific target is live, but will know all possible targets.

Something that just came in my mind: what prevents somebody enters the map as Blue, reads the briefing, knows the live target, and then shift to Red?

SoW Reddog
Jan-02-2014, 07:00
The "Don't be a complete dick rule"?

Kling
Jan-02-2014, 17:05
The "Don't be a complete dick rule"?
+1
Love it!! And Agree!!

ATAG_Freya
Jan-02-2014, 17:39
http://sd.keepcalm-o-matic.co.uk/i/keep-calm-and-dont-be-a-dick-29.png

SoW Reddog
Jan-02-2014, 17:54
Well, I'm pleased to say that I've now got a working method for targets which means I don't need to place a vehicle inside a building anymore to detect whether a building is destroyed. Works for both "building" and "static" objects, provided they're placed within the FMB or via code. This cuts the objects needed for a map considerably which means more objects can be used and means that I no longer need to rely on triggers and tweaking the % destroyed until it works! It does however rely on some script knowledge so it's less "plug and play" than the FMB version.

I'm still toying with ideas of how it's all going to work with regards to hitting the wrong target. I wonder if the concept is just a bit much for a public server and might be better suited to a campaign/squadron environment such as Storm of War.

Kling
Jan-02-2014, 18:17
Well, I'm pleased to say that I've now got a working method for targets which means I don't need to place a vehicle inside a building anymore to detect whether a building is destroyed. Works for both "building" and "static" objects, provided they're placed within the FMB or via code. This cuts the objects needed for a map considerably which means more objects can be used and means that I no longer need to rely on triggers and tweaking the % destroyed until it works! It does however rely on some script knowledge so it's less "plug and play" than the FMB version.

I'm still toying with ideas of how it's all going to work with regards to hitting the wrong target. I wonder if the concept is just a bit much for a public server and might be better suited to a campaign/squadron environment such as Storm of War.

Well done bud!
In your skills we trust! ;)

9./JG52_J-HAT
Jan-02-2014, 18:23
The "Don't be a complete dick rule"?

roflmao

9./JG52_J-HAT
Jan-02-2014, 18:27
Well, lI'd say go for it, Reddog.
Many were against your Death Wall in London Raids and it turned out people just know they shouldn't go to France and just don't (because there's enough to do over England also) and accepted it.

If is a too radical solution you came up with, I guess people will learn not to destroy the wrong target. Or they will complain a lot :)