DeathGround, by Requiem_for_a_Starfury (Single-Player)

Mapping & modding Fallout Tactics and reviewing maps thereof.
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Post by Forty-six & Two »

I copied your path cfg file to my path and now I have the sounds. But I couldnt make them work by changing sounds in-game oiptions. Strange.
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Post by Strap »

is this map reposted with fixes yet? it sounds great.
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Post by requiem_for_a_starfury »

Strapon2 wrote:is this map reposted with fixes yet? it sounds great.
Yeah it's been up for a few days, what'ya mean, you haven't downloaded it yet.
Forty-six & Two wrote:I copied your path cfg file to my path and now I have the sounds. But I couldnt make them work by changing sounds in-game oiptions. Strange.
Very strange indeed, though it'll probably turn out to be something silly like my volume levels are set higher or if you haven't got any files under custom music (and since the cfg is set for custom music) then you can actually here the sounds, because nothing else is playing. :)
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Post by Max-Violence »

Hey Req, just thought you'd like to know that since I upgraded my 'puter to 512 megs of RAM (used to have 256), I've noticed that the game doesn't lag nearly as much as it used to when drawing multiple flickering/blinking lights.

I also have yet to play the new version -- I'm knee-deep in Revenge 3. Soon as I'm done, tho :D
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Post by OnTheBounce »

Well, I dl'd this a while ago, but have been so busy w/Nuke on the Rubble and DaC itself that I haven't played it until this morning.

Here are some of the issues that I found, although I haven't finished the map yet due to some technical problems. (I've just finished clearing the outside of th surface.
  • I found a typo in Ronin's desc, "consiquently" should be spelled "consequently".
  • I liked the squad, which has some non-essential skills and also some quirky idiosyncrasies that make them more memorable. For instance Ronin's having survived the Glow and his love affair w/his Geiger Counter.
  • So far it seems you consistantly used SD's portraits, which is good, since it makes for a consistant look for the portraits of the characters.
  • I'm not sure about the fact that the squad are all "cheat" characters. That is to say, I'm not sure if it's a plus, or a minus.
  • The sound issue (impacts, etc.) is indeed due to Req's setting in the cfg file. I too noticed that things were a bit odd and changed the setting to my usual and things were kosher again. I was going to comment on lack of ambient sound, but I haven't unticked the "Custom Music" option yet.
  • Something I thought could have been done better was the Wright's defense of the place. They are simply milling around aimlessly. I think it would be better if some appeared to be on guard while others were milling around a doing things. Yes, some rovers would obviously be appropriate. Some other guards static, then some looking like they are loading things into the Brahmin carts perhaps. (I thought the Brahmin carts were excellent ideas, btw.) The main problem that I had w/this was that the Wrights tended to get clumped together at the center, and my way of dispatching them was to run Ronin in w/his Minigun and set to 1% accuracy, and the rest of the squad set up in a "kill sack".
  • The Wright's going hostile seems to be tied to entering the inner fence and having their leader spot you. I was able to walk in plain sight and loot the corpses while guards walked less than 10m from Tracy who was not sneaking. Maybe it would be better to start the Wrights hostile, then have the leader make his little speech when he sees the BoS troopers in the area.
  • The mines are not set to a hostile player index. This makes them very hard to see, especially in the quickly approaching darkness. Yes, I ended up reloading because of that since they are jam-packed so closely together that sympathetic detonation makes this sort of mishap a veritable catastrophe.
  • I think Ronin's Power Armor is a bit much. I haven't played the whole mission yet, so perhaps it becomes a neccesity. However, I killed quite a few enemies by simply charging them w/Ronin and his Super Sledge.
  • Minor canonical issue: the Wrights were adamantly opposed to Jet. It would probably be better to have a Jet cannister on a corpse it you're hell-bent on putting it on the map. Also, the inclusion of Jet makes Afterburner redundant, since it was the FoT version of Jet.
  • My machine slowed to a crawl when near the flickering lights. My machine is a PoS, though, and I think I'll give it another go in 800 x 600. This mod has caused my machine to lock up twice. :(
  • The tanks in the "motor park" flickered. I think you might want to look into replacing the scenery sprites w/tiles. (Although you might have laughed if you had seen me sneaking Lara over there and checking to see if she could get into any of them and loot something...) In general I think lots of the scenery sprites could use replacement w/tiles. I know, it's work, but this is my suggestion.
  • The snipers...I don't think they should be acrobats, walking along the edge of the roof like they are. I think it would be better to have them on the roof proper. They can't take cover while they're pulling their balancing act, it's also very easy for them to shoot you when you're very close to the building. (Personally I think cowering at the base of a wall is a perfectly legitimate tactic that should be encouraged, not punished. :lol: )
  • Still can't see the 10mm Pistol.
  • I found only very, very little ammo on the Wright soldiers. Those armed w/Tommy Guns, Grease Guns and 10mm subs were consistantly out of ammo, even though I had dispatched them rather quickly. (I'm not sure whether this was intentional or not.)
  • I'm still puzzled about the function of the switch at the generator station. Nothing I did would trip it.
Over all, I'd say that the map has a lot of potential, but it needs some refining/revising. But take this w/a grain (or shovel) of salt since I'm not very far into it yet.

BTW, I have to ask: you're a TB player and yet the cfg file was set to CTB. What mode do you intend this map to be played in?

Cheers,

OTB
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Post by requiem_for_a_starfury »

OnTheBounce wrote:Here are some of the issues that I found, although I haven't finished the map yet due to some technical problems. (I've just finished clearing the outside of th surface.
  • I found a typo in Ronin's desc, "consiquently" should be spelled "consequently".
:roll:
OnTheBounce wrote:[*] I liked the squad, which has some non-essential skills and also some quirky idiosyncrasies that make them more memorable. For instance Ronin's having survived the Glow and his love affair w/his Geiger Counter.
All based on my various player character's in FO1 & 2.
OnTheBounce wrote:[*] So far it seems you consistantly used SD's portraits, which is good, since it makes for a consistant look for the portraits of the characters.
Yeah SD's portrait pack is great, hopefully he'll do some more, especially for the non humans.
OnTheBounce wrote:[*] I'm not sure about the fact that the squad are all "cheat" characters. That is to say, I'm not sure if it's a plus, or a minus.
They're not really cheat characters, I wanted to reflect that they have some experience and they're skills etc were a reflection of their character.
OnTheBounce wrote:[*] The sound issue (impacts, etc.) is indeed due to Req's setting in the cfg file. I too noticed that things were a bit odd and changed the setting to my usual and things were kosher again. I was going to comment on lack of ambient sound, but I haven't unticked the "Custom Music" option yet.
Hmm I was looking at MV's new weapons in his last couple of maps and he hadn't set an impact sound for some of them. I think with the sound effects inside the depot from the computers and docking bays etc will make up for that, plus sometimes silence can add to the atmosphere, more than anything else.
OnTheBounce wrote:[*] Something I thought could have been done better was the Wright's defense of the place. They are simply milling around aimlessly. I think it would be better if some appeared to be on guard while others were milling around a doing things. Yes, some rovers would obviously be appropriate. Some other guards static, then some looking like they are loading things into the Brahmin carts perhaps. (I thought the Brahmin carts were excellent ideas, btw.) The main problem that I had w/this was that the Wrights tended to get clumped together at the center, and my way of dispatching them was to run Ronin in w/his Minigun and set to 1% accuracy, and the rest of the squad set up in a "kill sack".
Point taken, I was just going for the effect that they had only recently arrived, the Wrights are only a small part of the mission.
OnTheBounce wrote:[*] The Wright's going hostile seems to be tied to entering the inner fence and having their leader spot you. I was able to walk in plain sight and loot the corpses while guards walked less than 10m from Tracy who was not sneaking. Maybe it would be better to start the Wrights hostile, then have the leader make his little speech when he sees the BoS troopers in the area.
My intention was that they don't care about the bodies outside the base (they've already checked them for loot) only when you enter the base compound do they care what you do, if that makes any sense?
OnTheBounce wrote:[*] The mines are not set to a hostile player index. This makes them very hard to see, especially in the quickly approaching darkness. Yes, I ended up reloading because of that since they are jam-packed so closely together that sympathetic detonation makes this sort of mishap a veritable catastrophe.
Hmm in my testing they get spotted straight away, every time. Sacrifice one of the grenades to get rid of them.
OnTheBounce wrote:[*] I think Ronin's Power Armor is a bit much. I haven't played the whole mission yet, so perhaps it becomes a neccesity. However, I killed quite a few enemies by simply charging them w/Ronin and his Super Sledge.
He'll be needing it later on.
OnTheBounce wrote:[*] Minor canonical issue: the Wrights were adamantly opposed to Jet. It would probably be better to have a Jet cannister on a corpse it you're hell-bent on putting it on the map. Also, the inclusion of Jet makes Afterburner redundant, since it was the FoT version of Jet.
I don't remember putting any afterburner in the map, but most of the Wrights in the game are hired guns from New Reno rather than family and jet is nearly everywhere in New Reno.
OnTheBounce wrote:[*] My machine slowed to a crawl when near the flickering lights. My machine is a PoS, though, and I think I'll give it another go in 800 x 600. This mod has caused my machine to lock up twice. :(
Hmm, funny lights don't give my machine any problems, it's sounds (since I don't have a proper soundcard) that slow my machine down. In future though I'll be more carefull in my use of lighting.
OnTheBounce wrote:[*] The tanks in the "motor park" flickered. I think you might want to look into replacing the scenery sprites w/tiles. (Although you might have laughed if you had seen me sneaking Lara over there and checking to see if she could get into any of them and loot something...) In general I think lots of the scenery sprites could use replacement w/tiles. I know, it's work, but this is my suggestion.
The tanks were left over from a plot line I cut out, I'm not sure what you mean by flickered but your checking them out was exactly the sort of reaction I was after.
OnTheBounce wrote:[*] The snipers...I don't think they should be acrobats, walking along the edge of the roof like they are. I think it would be better to have them on the roof proper. They can't take cover while they're pulling their balancing act, it's also very easy for them to shoot you when you're very close to the building. (Personally I think cowering at the base of a wall is a perfectly legitimate tactic that should be encouraged, not punished. :lol: )
I had lots of problems moving about on the roof, perhaps I should of put a low wall around the roof to stop them moving right to the edge.
OnTheBounce wrote:[*] Still can't see the 10mm Pistol.
@*!%**@! :evil:
OnTheBounce wrote:[*] I found only very, very little ammo on the Wright soldiers. Those armed w/Tommy Guns, Grease Guns and 10mm subs were consistantly out of ammo, even though I had dispatched them rather quickly. (I'm not sure whether this was intentional or not.)
Yep ammo is sparse in my version of the Fallout Universe.
OnTheBounce wrote:[*] I'm still puzzled about the function of the switch at the generator station. Nothing I did would trip it. [/list]
Pure window dressing, and a little surprise (hopefully) for the curious.
OnTheBounce wrote:Over all, I'd say that the map has a lot of potential, but it needs some refining/revising. But take this w/a grain (or shovel) of salt since I'm not very far into it yet.

BTW, I have to ask: you're a TB player and yet the cfg file was set to CTB. What mode do you intend this map to be played in?

Cheers,

OTB
Either, my attempt at doing a TB only map didn't seem to be popular so altough I did most of my testing in TB I played through in CTB before I zipped it up to make sure that worked as well.

Well thanks for the comments, I hope that you'll have fun playing throught the rest of the map.
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Post by Max-Violence »

Gee OTB, does this mean you've taken a vacation from mapping and are playing some maps now, or wut?

About "my" weapons lack of sound impact noises: I have no idea. Some of 'em are annoying to me, and the ones left over get annoying when one hears 'em over and over and over and over and over and...

And OTB: Trust Req. Ronin NEEDS the Power Armor later on.
Closing our eyes forces us to look
At the darkness inside.
Our emotions always find us
Regardless of where we hide.

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Post by requiem_for_a_starfury »

Max-Violence wrote:Gee OTB, does this mean you've taken a vacation from mapping and are playing some maps now, or wut?

About "my" weapons lack of sound impact noises: I have no idea. Some of 'em are annoying to me, and the ones left over get annoying when one hears 'em over and over and over and over and over and...

And OTB: Trust Req. Ronin NEEDS the Power Armor later on.
Especially the impact sounds for metal and power armour, ugh like bitting into silver sweet paper, sets your teeth on edge.

I don't actually have FOT installed right now but if anyone's interested JA2 has some nice impact sounds etc which can be used in FOT.
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Post by OnTheBounce »

requiem_for_a_starfury wrote: (Regarding typos) :roll:
Right, I guess I won't tell you about some of the other typos I found then. :lol:
requiem_for_a_starfury wrote:All based on my various player character's in FO1 & 2.
Ah, I see. Req, you've played some dumb motherfuckers then. :lol: (JK. I like seeing stupid characters in squads. It's not like the average grunt is all that bright, even in the BoS, I imagine.)
requiem_for_a_starfury wrote:They're not really cheat characters, I wanted to reflect that they have some experience and they're skills etc were a reflection of their character.
Well, there's a nifty little button marked "Level" in the Entity Editor that gives you the same effect... ;)
requiem_for_a_starfury wrote:Point [about the Wrights] taken, I was just going for the effect that they had only recently arrived, the Wrights are only a small part of the mission.
Yes, I can see that, now. Still, I think having them look more like they're looting the place could easily be the touch between a good and a great mission.
OnTheBounce wrote:My intention was that they don't care about the bodies outside the base (they've already checked them for loot) only when you enter the base compound do they care what you do, if that makes any sense?
Yes, it makes sense. Still, you could have the Wrights react to the PCs getting too close. You could have them using one set of float texts 'til the PCs get close, then have them start using lines like, "Let's cap them fucks if they come in here."
requiem_for_a_starfury wrote:Hmm in my testing they get spotted straight away, every time. Sacrifice one of the grenades to get rid of them.
The problem wasn't them getting spotted. The Anti-Personell mines by the gap in the fence were spotted right off the bat, but their graphic is small than their bounding box. Having a nifty red circle under them makes it easier to navigate. I didn't think to clear them w/a grenade, though. :oops:
requiem_for_a_starfury wrote:[Ronin]'ll be needing [Power Armor] later on.
Uh, yeah. :lol: In one of my iterations Orville Wright sprayed him down w/the rather nasty G-11 and good ol' Ronin danced to the rhythm of lead. There was much weeping and gnashing of teeth in the wake of that.
requiem_for_a_starfury wrote:I don't remember putting any afterburner in the map, but most of the Wrights in the game are hired guns from New Reno rather than family and jet is nearly everywhere in New Reno.
Yes, there's one unit. IIRC on one of the corpses. Perhaps it was in the inventory of one of the dead actors you used?

Like I said, it's really a minor issue, something that doesn't ruin the mission, but a minor canonical issue, and it's your mission.
requiem_for_a_starfury wrote:In future though I'll be more carefull in my use of lighting.
I hate doing lighting in a mission. Almost as much as speech. :hmph:
requiem_for_a_starfury wrote:I had lots of problems moving about on the roof, perhaps I should of put a low wall around the roof to stop them moving right to the edge.
One of the things that I was going to suggest about the roof would be to put some sort of cover up there, perhaps in the form of Ruined City Stair Walls that make pedestals for the equipment. (I hope that's clear enough.)
requiem_for_a_starfury wrote:Yep ammo is sparse in my version of the Fallout Universe.
Gotcha. I wasn't sure if you'd botched up the Non-Lootable quantities, or if that's the way you wanted it.

Okay, now to my suggestions based on this afternoon's playing:

Doors: I suggest taking the sensors off of those bloody doors. They really interfere w/playing. For those that you want to unlock via a switch, I suggest having the trigger that unlocks them also open them, so the player knows exactly what he/she just did. However, the player should be free to open/close the doors as he/she sees fit.

Locks: These are potentially a show-stopper. The difficulty you've set some of them almost assumes that poor Lara will be putting each and every SP she's getting into picking locks. The commander's safe being set at 130 difficulty can easily make this mission unwinnable if Lara doesn't have enough points in LP. I would suggest that rather than having the safe be very difficult to pick, simply make it impossible, and put a key entity on the Base Commander's corpse. (A scrawled note w/the combination would be a good excuse.) On one of my iterations the squad was dashing up to the surface, when Lara was caught by a force field and cut neatly in half. Show stopper. Time to reload.

Keys: Please color code the fucking things, please!!! :lol: Seriously, this is very confusing, especially if one doesn't keep all keys on the same person.

Also, I discovered another show-stopper: I had Lara carrying all of the keys. Unfortunately she was on the other side of a forcefield (outside of the room w/the Wrights) when the force fields went up. She had the retinal scanner override for that level. Ergo I couldn't go forward, nor backward. Time to reload.

Armor: I think plain Jane Combat Armor would be a better choice for what is found in SAD. If you're looking for something heavier, maybe you should consider CA Mk II, rather than BA. I also think that you should revamp the armor progression. Yes, the squad needs heavy armor later, but it makes for a very unbalanced beginning. Most of the Wright soldiers were able to inflict only very minor wounds on the squad, and there was a lot of being hit for no damage.

Weapons: I think the weapons and ammo need a lot of work, but that's a rather in-depth subject that we can discuss later. Some things I will mention are the .223 pistol's very puny sound -- It needs bark and authority, man! -- another is the fact that the .223 ammo is not FMJ, which renders a Hunting Rifle rather useless against even Leather Armor. More on that when you're ready, though.

The Defenders: Once I was in the base the Wrights seemed to be just standing around, waiting in hallways for me to show up and kill them. You could easily make an improvised defense look very plausible w/a few tactically placed crates here and there that they would be hiding behind, for instance.

Okay, that's it for now. I'm going to give it one more go before I turn in.

Cheers,

OTB

PS I laughed my ass off at Barnaky/Vic. Looks like the brain extraction was a bit messy, though... :o
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Post by requiem_for_a_starfury »

OnTheBounce wrote:Right, I guess I won't tell you about some of the other typos I found then. :lol:
Well if you've made a note of them PM them to me please, might as well do the job properly.
OnTheBounce wrote:Ah, I see. Req, you've played some dumb motherfuckers then. :lol: (JK. I like seeing stupid characters in squads. It's not like the average grunt is all that bright, even in the BoS, I imagine.)
Playing intelligent, perceptive characters all the time can get quite boring, at least with the Fallout RPG's you can actually get somewhere (and have just as much fun) playing the dunce.
OnTheBounce wrote:Well, there's a nifty little button marked "Level" in the Entity Editor that gives you the same effect... ;)
As I mentioned in the other forum, I reset their experience to 0 to make sure that they would gain skill points, I've found that some standalone maps the characters level, but you can't edit them.
OnTheBounce wrote:Yes, I can see that, now. Still, I think having them look more like they're looting the place could easily be the touch between a good and a great mission.

The Defenders: Once I was in the base the Wrights seemed to be just standing around, waiting in hallways for me to show up and kill them. You could easily make an improvised defense look very plausible w/a few tactically placed crates here and there that they would be hiding behind, for instance.
I admit that the Wrights should have been more dynamic, I guess my creative urges petered out when I came to setting up their waypoints, as for defences I was torn between keeping items in the map as close to the RPG as possible, or making it more tactically inspired, in the end I decided to try and keep the areas that you could see in the RPG as close as possible, in light of this I guess I should of moved the initial action to another entrance to the Depot, this would of allowed for defensive positions to be set up but would of meant extending the surface area further.
OnTheBounce wrote:Yes, it makes sense. Still, you could have the Wrights react to the PCs getting too close. You could have them using one set of float texts 'til the PCs get close, then have them start using lines like, "Let's cap them fucks if they come in here."
Yeah writing dialogue is one of the hardest parts of map making for me, my ideas can get hampered by my not being able to write suitable speech nodes.
OnTheBounce wrote:The problem wasn't them getting spotted. The Anti-Personell mines by the gap in the fence were spotted right off the bat, but their graphic is small than their bounding box. Having a nifty red circle under them makes it easier to navigate. I didn't think to clear them w/a grenade, though. :oops:
There shouldn't be any room to pass the mines, my intention was always that you either use force fire to clear them or go round to the main gate.
OnTheBounce wrote:Uh, yeah. :lol: In one of my iterations Orville Wright sprayed him down w/the rather nasty G-11 and good ol' Ronin danced to the rhythm of lead. There was much weeping and gnashing of teeth in the wake of that.
:badgrin:

OnTheBounce wrote:Yes, there's one unit. IIRC on one of the corpses. Perhaps it was in the inventory of one of the dead actors you used?

Like I said, it's really a minor issue, something that doesn't ruin the mission, but a minor canonical issue, and it's your mission.
Damn never even thought to check the inventories of the stock dead actors, wonder what else made it into the map that shouldn't be there.
OnTheBounce wrote:I hate doing lighting in a mission. Almost as much as speech. :hmph:
For me speech is the hardest but lighting the most annoying.
OnTheBounce wrote:One of the things that I was going to suggest about the roof would be to put some sort of cover up there, perhaps in the form of Ruined City Stair Walls that make pedestals for the equipment. (I hope that's clear enough.)
Yeah I think I know what you're talking about, or maybe some brick halfwalls if there are any (can't remember now).
OnTheBounce wrote:Okay, now to my suggestions based on this afternoon's playing:
Oh boy let me get out the kevlar first.... okay go ahead.
OnTheBounce wrote:Doors: I suggest taking the sensors off of those bloody doors. They really interfere w/playing. For those that you want to unlock via a switch, I suggest having the trigger that unlocks them also open them, so the player knows exactly what he/she just did. However, the player should be free to open/close the doors as he/she sees fit.
Hmm they can get a teeny weeny bit annoying from time to time, okay I'll deactivate the sensors.
OnTheBounce wrote:Locks: These are potentially a show-stopper. The difficulty you've set some of them almost assumes that poor Lara will be putting each and every SP she's getting into picking locks. The commander's safe being set at 130 difficulty can easily make this mission unwinnable if Lara doesn't have enough points in LP. I would suggest that rather than having the safe be very difficult to pick, simply make it impossible, and put a key entity on the Base Commander's corpse. (A scrawled note w/the combination would be a good excuse.) On one of my iterations the squad was dashing up to the surface, when Lara was caught by a force field and cut neatly in half. Show stopper. Time to reload.
By the time you've needed to unlock the safe she should have enough skill points in Lock picking from just using the skill books and the Lockpicking upgrade, likewise for one of the other characters but I'll have to double check my notes on that.
OnTheBounce wrote:Keys: Please color code the fucking things, please!!! :lol: Seriously, this is very confusing, especially if one doesn't keep all keys on the same person.
I was being intentionally cruel when I made the keys all identical, originally they were colour coded per level, but I think I was in an evil mood that day.
OnTheBounce wrote:Also, I discovered another show-stopper: I had Lara carrying all of the keys. Unfortunately she was on the other side of a forcefield (outside of the room w/the Wrights) when the force fields went up. She had the retinal scanner override for that level. Ergo I couldn't go forward, nor backward. Time to reload.
I can't remember off the top of my head but those doors should be fairly easy to lockpick, though I might replace them with destroyable versions.
OnTheBounce wrote:Armor: I think plain Jane Combat Armor would be a better choice for what is found in SAD. If you're looking for something heavier, maybe you should consider CA Mk II, rather than BA. I also think that you should revamp the armor progression. Yes, the squad needs heavy armor later, but it makes for a very unbalanced beginning. Most of the Wright soldiers were able to inflict only very minor wounds on the squad, and there was a lot of being hit for no damage.
Your squad should have BA but unless I made another boob the armour to be found in the Depot should be CA and CA MKII, I'll have to double check that. As for the armour progression I wanted them to start out equipped as any seasoned Brotherhood squad, rather than like the bunch of noobs in Brahmin Wood, the Wrights should have plenty of Armour Piercing ammo (that is Depleted Uranium ammo renamed as AP).
OnTheBounce wrote:Weapons: I think the weapons and ammo need a lot of work, but that's a rather in-depth subject that we can discuss later. Some things I will mention are the .223 pistol's very puny sound -- It needs bark and authority, man! -- another is the fact that the .223 ammo is not FMJ, which renders a Hunting Rifle rather useless against even Leather Armor. More on that when you're ready, though.
Hmm I could of sworn the .223 was set to FMJ, and IIRC I think the sound I downloaded with the sprite (which was meant to be the sound ported from the RPG). As for the rest of the weapons I used Yuri Bushin's spreadsheet for reference but please PM me about them when you have the spare time.
OnTheBounce wrote:PS I laughed my ass off at Barnaky/Vic. Looks like the brain extraction was a bit messy, though... :o
Good that's exactly what I was hoping for. :)
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Post by OnTheBounce »

requiem_for_a_starfury wrote:Hmm I could of sworn the .223 was set to FMJ, and IIRC I think the sound I downloaded with the sprite (which was meant to be the sound ported from the RPG)...
You did. I made a mistake here, it was the 7.62mm I was thinking of, not the .223. :oops:
requiem wrote:...please PM me about them when you have the spare time.
Okay, I'll put together a PM or email w/my issues and suggestions on weapons. Oh, BTW, having both the damage raised and the AP cost lowered for grenades made them overly powerful, IMHO. I think you should go w/one or the other, but not both. Otherwise grenadiers are a bit too powerful. As it was I had the grenadier on Overwatch and he was killing mutants as they rounded a corner. If that was the effect you were looking for 6 AP cost would have been fine. But w/the cost set to 3 AP a grenadier can loose a volley of grenades and lay pretty much anything low.

Oh, one last thing: I would like to apologize for all of the nasty names I called you when I didn't have a Science skill high enough to get the switch. Poor Albert was all pumped up on Mentats, had no armor on and managed to get royally irradiated only to have the base go up. :grumble-grumble: 210 skill modifier :grumble-grumble:

Cheers,

OTB
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Post by requiem_for_a_starfury »

OnTheBounce wrote:Okay, I'll put together a PM or email w/my issues and suggestions on weapons.
No hurry, as I said I don't have the game installed at the moment so I won't be getting around to fixing things for a while.
OnTheBounce wrote:Oh, BTW, having both the damage raised and the AP cost lowered for grenades made them overly powerful, IMHO. I think you should go w/one or the other, but not both. Otherwise grenadiers are a bit too powerful. As it was I had the grenadier on Overwatch and he was killing mutants as they rounded a corner. If that was the effect you were looking for 6 AP cost would have been fine. But w/the cost set to 3 AP a grenadier can loose a volley of grenades and lay pretty much anything low.
I would of taken the damage from the same reference source as the other weapons but 3APs is definately a mistake, that's left over from another project. Question how many grenades make a volley? I didn't think I put that many in the map :( .
OnTheBounce wrote:Oh, one last thing: I would like to apologize for all of the nasty names I called you when I didn't have a Science skill high enough to get the switch. Poor Albert was all pumped up on Mentats, had no armor on and managed to get royally irradiated only to have the base go up. :grumble-grumble: 210 skill modifier :grumble-grumble:

Cheers,

OTB
:? I thought I lowered that, or then again it was probably even higher to start with. But the same goes as with the lockpicking there should be enough special enhancements, skill books and mentats for him to be able to make the skill check, even if you pumped up his other skills rather than his science skill. Then again the science consols that can shut down the doors permantly should provide a big enough clue that Albert is going to need to bone up on his science homework :).

*Spoiler*


Did you have him carry the disarm key when he used his science skill on the console? That tends to help IIRC.
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Post by OnTheBounce »

requiem_for_a_starfury wrote:No hurry, as I said I don't have the game installed at the moment so I won't be getting around to fixing things for a while.
Okay, I'll get you a complete, in-depth and thorough review/trouble-shooting as soon as I'm done w/this sprite nightmare that I'm trapped in and have Nuke on the Rubble complete. (The latter has just a bit more tilework remaining, and I've started on Scripting and Speech, so it shouldn't be too long now.
requiem wrote:Question how many grenades make a volley? I didn't think I put that many in the map :( .
The mutants were often able to move, then still get off three grenades, which caused me -- *ahem* -- to reload once since I lost my main character to a charging mutie grenadier. I should not have thought, "Okay, he won't be able to get off more than one grenade..." :oops: Imagine my surprise when he whipped three of them at me. :lol:
requiem wrote:But the same goes as with the lockpicking there should be enough special enhancements, skill books and mentats for him to be able to make the skill check, even if you pumped up his other skills rather than his science skill.
Speaking of skill enhancers, you might want to consider using the PipBoy Lingual and Medical Enhancer sprites for some of those. They survived the re-sizing very nicely and I've been planning to use them for "book" entities all along. I suppose the Lingual Enhancer would make a good "Lock Pick Course". There's also Cat's Paw Issue #5 for an e-weapons book.
requiem wrote:Did you have him carry the disarm key when he used his science skill on the console? That tends to help IIRC.
I had him equipped with it the second time and managed to get through it after I'd backed up and pumped up his Science skill. It took a bit, but I was able to stop the countdown w/8 minutes and change remaining on the clock. Then the 'bots killed Tracy...

I'd say that this mission is better suited to TB play than CTB, BTW. The tight confines you're fighting in a lot of the time make CTB rather difficult w/a slightly off-target mouse-click often meaning that someone makes a "real estate deal".

Cheers,

OTB
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Post by requiem_for_a_starfury »

OnTheBounce wrote:Okay, I'll get you a complete, in-depth and thorough review/trouble-shooting as soon as I'm done w/this sprite nightmare that I'm trapped in and have Nuke on the Rubble complete. (The latter has just a bit more tilework remaining, and I've started on Scripting and Speech, so it shouldn't be too long now.
I'll look forward to it with trepidation. :)
OnTheBounce wrote:The mutants were often able to move, then still get off three grenades, which caused me -- *ahem* -- to reload once since I lost my main character to a charging mutie grenadier. I should not have thought, "Okay, he won't be able to get off more than one grenade..." :oops: Imagine my surprise when he whipped three of them at me. :lol:
:lol: :D :lol: Maybe I'll keep them to 3APs after all. :badgrin: :p ;)
OnTheBounce wrote:Speaking of skill enhancers, you might want to consider using the PipBoy Lingual and Medical Enhancer sprites for some of those. They survived the re-sizing very nicely and I've been planning to use them for "book" entities all along. I suppose the Lingual Enhancer would make a good "Lock Pick Course". There's also Cat's Paw Issue #5 for an e-weapons book.
Yeah they were originally planned to have the red module, yellow module sprites etc, but I didn't want to wear out my welcome by keep asking you and JJ for more new sprites all the time.
OnTheBounce wrote:I had him equipped with it the second time and managed to get through it after I'd backed up and pumped up his Science skill. It took a bit, but I was able to stop the countdown w/8 minutes and change remaining on the clock. Then the 'bots killed Tracy...
:badgrin: :lol: 8)
OnTheBounce wrote:I'd say that this mission is better suited to TB play than CTB, BTW. The tight confines you're fighting in a lot of the time make CTB rather difficult w/a slightly off-target mouse-click often meaning that someone makes a "real estate deal".

Cheers,

OTB
My thoughts exactly, but it is possible to complete in CTB, and CTB combat with the timer counting down should keep adrenalin seeking CTB munchkins happy.
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