[Primus]

Working hard...

First version of the FA campaign 5 (TBP), mission 2.
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Note. In the briefing there's 'system ??'  because the systems hasn't been decided yet.

85% of this mission was done tonight. Been fredding all day long...

[karajorma]

Well this will make a nice break from working on the FAQ

[Fergus]

I'll get testing this too.

[karajorma]

I quite liked the mission The sentri were tough but killable. I didn't feel particularly threatened by them at any point but I was playing on easy.

 Technically I found a few flaws with the timing of the messages but when I look at the mission in FRED I can't see anything you've done particularly wrong. I'll try the mission again with the voice synth turned off and see if that makes things better.

Apart from that

• The first wing of centauri fighters appear to jump in though and that's just wrong. Fighters can't form a jump point on their own. Have them appear with no warp effect and say that they've sneaked in on a low power approach.
• Why does the G'Tok have beam free orders for a sensor subsystem? In the g'tok lock main guns and g'tok free main guns You appear to be locking and freeing the wrong subsystem.
• The Narn fighters will all accept a depart order from the player. Since fighters can't jump out on their own this needs to be fixed from the player orders options.
• :lol: The last one made me laugh. I thought you guys knew by now that I always check for an AWOL debrief. I noticed you've fixed the mission so that Alpha 1 can't leap out (which I was impressed by) but you made one error. Start the mission and immediately press Alt-J. You'll kick yourself when you see what happens.

Not bad for a first go though. This one is pretty close to being done as is.

[Primus]

You know.. I played the mission without any pilot anis, because they messed up the timing of the messages. I thought it was because I have a low-end PC.

I'll fix those things. And why? Oh, why did you press Alt-J at the beginning?


[EDIT] The mission is pretty easy on medium too. Although the Sentris knocked out my sensors five times.. Anyway, I was thinking maybe adding a one more wing of Centauri fighters jumping in with the Vorchan..

[karajorma]

Originally posted by Primus
I'll fix those things. And why? Oh, why did you press Alt-J at the beginning?

Cause sooner or later someone playing the mission will. Notice the whole form up and jump. Anyone not used to TBP would probably press Alt-J as soon as it appears and then be confused as to how their fighter was able to make its own jump point.

I found another error. One of the centauri fighters took it into their head to go fight with T'Bok wing. Don't give them attack any ship orders or you will find them doing that occassionally.

[Primus]

Originally posted by karajorma

I found another error. One of the centauri fighters took it into their head to go fight with T'Bok wing. Don't give them attack any ship orders or you will find them doing that occassionally.

I have to say that I didn't find that error. But, I noticed that few times a Centauri fighter heads for the gate. Is it because the gate isn't marked as 'invisible to sensors' (or what is was called)?.

[karajorma]

He's probably heading to the gate cause that's where T'Bok wing are

That said I suppose it's possible that he might consider the gate a target too (It's probably a good standard practice to protect and beam protect jump gates in TBP).

[Primus]

Yeap. The gate is protected, beam protected and invunerable and now invisible to sensors. And I've fixed those little problems too.
Off to playtest it... Soon...


[EDIT] ...Hidden From Sensors.

[Primus]

Okay.. I don't get it. For some reason, couple of Centauri fighters head for the jumpgate. The gate is marked as: Cargo Known, Protect Ship, Beam Protect Ship, Invulnerable, Hidden from Sensors. And the team is friendly.

[karajorma]

You sure that they're not going after that wing of narn fighters that jump in from the node? That's what I mean when I say that they're going after T'bok wing. T'Bok wing jump in about 10,000m away from all the action. The first time I played the game I actually saw them fighting with the sentri that went over to the jump node.

I think they're ignoring the jump gate all right. They're not ignoring that wing of fighters though. I had a mission once where I gave a wing of Maras orders to attack alpha wing. For reasons I won't go into Alpha 4 was 100,000m away and yet Cancer 4 decided to go have a fight with it.

It appears that the game doesn't pick and choose the targets it goes after based on how close it is to the enemy fighter.

[Fergus]

It may be a good idea to make the player wait for the wing that arrives, maybe do this by increasing the time it takes to scan..not sure how you would do this.  So far nothing seems to have gone horribly wrong, my only realy gripe is that the mission is not very challenging, the player gets 10 other fighters, don't be afraid to swarm the player a little bit.  Also the comms msg telling the player to stay away from the Centari cruiser does seem a bit odd as my wing had no probs killing it several times.  Still for a first draft it is very impressive.
Also, what ambience is recommended?

[Primus]

I was playtesting the mission and noticed something what makes it easy. When the Centauri cruiser and fighters jump in, the defence platform shoots the Vorcan and the blast damages the CR fighters severly.
That's why it's pretty easy to take 'em out.

So I'll remove or re-position the platform...

[karajorma]

Ah. I noticed that. I thought shooting the Vorchan was intentional though

[Primus]

Yeah.. But fighters getting damage was not.

[NGTM-1R]

Move the fighters then.

[karajorma]

Problem with that is that they have to jump in next to the Vorchan since B5 fighters can't form their own jump points.

Moving the gun would improve the mission. In fact you'll make the mission a lot better if the player and the G'quon have to take out the Vorchan.

[Primus]

I will do that. I always wondered why the first two CR fighters are harder to take out than the rest...
I'll probably release the mission tonight.

[Primus]

It wasn't the defence platform that damages the Vorchan and Centauri fighters. It was the G'Quan shooting it's goddamn energy mines...

[karajorma]

I noticed that it was an energy mine. I didn't know that it wasn't the platform firing it.

I guess you can break the turret and say that it's offline for repairs.