VWBB - Your job- Fix this before release, right here

Show all 18 posts from this thread on one page

VWBB (https://volitionwatch.game-warden.com/vwbb/index.php)
- The Babylon Project (https://volitionwatch.game-warden.com/vwbb/forumdisplay.php?forumid=16)
-- Your job- Fix this before release, right here (https://volitionwatch.game-warden.com/vwbb/showthread.php?threadid=8994)

Posted by Strider on 05-25-2003 07:18 PM:

Your job- Fix this before release, right here

Okay, my mission is nearly complete. I just need some help if people wouldn't mind!!!!!

I'll give the details of my mission, briefly, and then you can comment, or answer my soon to come questions. Or just skip the details part.

DETAILS:

STORY: Raiders are packing some new heat attacking supply lines.

Centauri are doing the same. This is during the Centauri attacks on the ISA. They appear to be working together, but EA doesn't know why the Centauri would join the weak raiders.

We follow a damaged Centauri cruiser to its jump point in hyperspace. Begin mission:

Omega and 3 wings jump in, destroy a half dead Centauri warship (easy) then head for the oncoming convoy.

Omega opens fire slaughtering the transports, our fighters take out the enemy escort of starfurys. The raiders have been upgrading.

Centauri fighters launch from the raider battlewagon escorting the convoy. Harder to kill, we take them out as well.

After this is done (objective 1- destroy enemy convoy) we head for the space station and engage. Easy, but a raider fighter carrier jumps in, 3 wings. We engage that while the Omega recieves orders to return to the jump gate, and use its rear cannons if it can to take out the station. No time to lose- orders.

We take out the raiders and their carrier, and the station blows up. If possible, scan the cargo pods (part of mission) to see whats in them. (if you do, then you'll see that they house shadow control orbs......command realizes the raiders got ahold of some when they beefed up their efforts and got some cash. They mounted an attack on a centauri shipyard and stole 6 or more warships and some fighters. They are now a power to be reckoned with)

On our way back to the jump gate, five centauri vorchan warships jump in. They either a) destroy the omega and we flee, ending mission on a sad note, or
b) we escape with pounded omega, and continue for another mission I would make.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

QUESTIONS, COMMENTS, answer or post HERE:

1) Are missions that are too hard, annoying or stupid? I can do this, but it is a big challange.

2) Can I release this with a command briefing and no normal briefing or debriefing? I cant figure those out and dont wanna learn (cause I never need em).

3) Mission objectives that go in the briefing......I have some, and they are from "mission objectives" under editors tab in FRED2 right?

4) IN GAME objectives on the left of HUD are from "events" I make right? Should I bother putting fighter wings to be destroyed, or leave it with "destroy enemy convoy (4)" for the four cruisers......get it? Only objectives are to take out cruisers, not fighters.....bad bad, no?

5) With no EVENTS except beam free all........missions aren't boring right? Mine seems fun, and I dont want any stupid "what the......engines blew up! eject the warp core! repair it while we sit a drift" and all that crap....ie: I dont want to fool around with weird sabatages and breaching pod stuff until later.

6) I HATE spending hours putting in in game messages. I MUST have them for a release, right? Is it BETTER or WORSE to put them in after the mission is complete? Should I do it while I make mission (I remember changing it always then).

I gotta go, lotsa typing and my arm is spazing. Sorry for my lack of good grammer. THANKS

__________________
"It has been my observation that if you cannot say what you mean, you can truly never mean what you say"

Babylon 5

Posted by whitelight on 05-25-2003 09:36 PM:

Sounds good to me eather way you do it..

The only prob with putting in just a command briefing and no briefing is that the command briefing will show up in the briefing, unless you use some kind of text in the briefing to keep it from loading the cammand briefing..

You have some very good ideas for missions, just my 2 cents... Others may not feel the same, but I think you got something there worth following through with..

Posted by Strider on 05-25-2003 10:06 PM:

Thanks mate.

Now....can you tell me how to put some text into briefing so my command briefing wont show (I noticed it does).

Even a little "Sorry, I dont know how to make briefings" in the briefing?

I was thinking of changing the 5 Centauri Vorchan cruisers that jump in at the last minute into various capital ships that the raiders captured and have under their control now.....

Just gotta get around the fact that puny raiders captured a narn ship, earth vessel, etc......(Certanly not a Minbari one).

I'll work it into the story (new allies or something).

So yeah.......at the end, when it looks like the Raider base was wiped out, I'll have a couple Centauri war ships jump in, a Narn capital ship, an Earth Hyperion or something.......hmm cool cool. Some Drakh too.

This will lead to my next mission where we can see Earth and their allies take on the Raiders and their new ships.

__________________
"It has been my observation that if you cannot say what you mean, you can truly never mean what you say"

Babylon 5

Posted by karajorma on 05-26-2003 07:35 AM:

Re: Your job- Fix this before release, right here

quote:
Originally posted by Strider
1) Are missions that are too hard, annoying or stupid? I can do this, but it is a big challange.

Don't make your mission too hard as it's annoying. You want to challenge people not humiliate them

quote:
Originally posted by Strider
2) Can I release this with a command briefing and no normal briefing or debriefing? I cant figure those out and dont wanna learn (cause I never need em).

I'm not trying to be nasty here but if you can't be bothered to do them then you'll find that lots of people can't be bothered to play your mission either. A good mission tells a story. Not including a debrief is like missing the last few minutes of the film or the last few pages out of the book. Okay the hero may have won but you can't end the film and go straight to the credits the second the bad guy dies.
The debrief ties up a lot of grey areas. Often things occur during the mission that the player might have missed. The debrief is where you should clear up any such confusion.
The briefing is much less important seeing as how you have a command briefing but if you don't include one your mission will look poor in comparison to one which did.

quote:
Originally posted by Strider
3) Mission objectives that go in the briefing......I have some, and they are from "mission objectives" under editors tab in FRED2 right?

Yep.

quote:
Originally posted by Strider
4) IN GAME objectives on the left of HUD are from "events" I make right? Should I bother putting fighter wings to be destroyed, or leave it with "destroy enemy convoy (4)" for the four cruisers......get it? Only objectives are to take out cruisers, not fighters.....bad bad, no?

If destroying the fighter wings is important to the mission then put them in. If at the start command want you to kill everything then there should be orders to do that. If later the friendly caps are running for their lives you can miss them out to reflect that command is more worried about saving its capship.

quote:
Originally posted by Strider
5) With no EVENTS except beam free all........missions aren't boring right? Mine seems fun, and I dont want any stupid "what the......engines blew up! eject the warp core! repair it while we sit a drift" and all that crap....ie: I dont want to fool around with weird sabatages and breaching pod stuff until later.

6) I HATE spending hours putting in in game messages. I MUST have them for a release, right? Is it BETTER or WORSE to put them in after the mission is complete? Should I do it while I make mission (I remember changing it always then).

You don't need to have anything like repair missions etc for a mission but you do need more than beam-free-alls. Messages for one thing. You'll also need to change the orders for the other friendly fighters or they will continue to attack instead of defending when the mission goes wrong.

You DEFINATELY need to put in-game messages in. Whether you complete the mission and then put them in or put them in as you go along is your choice but you shouldn't miss them out.
In game messages add drama to the situation and point out events that the player might not have seen cause he was too busy playing the game.

__________________
Questions about FS3? Questions about Fred? Questions about missions? Questions about adding new ships to your games?

[URL=http://homepage.ntlworld.com/karajorma/freespace/intro.html]Karajorma's Freespace FAQ [/URL] (now with added GE goodness)

Supreme Overlord of The Mercury Affair Campaign.

FREDder, Modder, Story design and general busybody for [URL=http://www.3dap.com/hlp/hosted/mindgames/Background.html] Mind Games[/URL]

Posted by Mr. Fury on 05-26-2003 11:53 AM:

Quite funny, I missed the word "before" in the topic name when I read it the first time.

Now, carry on.

__________________
[URL=http://freespace.volitionwatch.com/babylon/]The Babylon Project homepage[/URL] <> [URL=http://freespace.volitionwatch.com/babylon/faq.php]The Babylon Project FAQ[/URL] <> [URL=http://freespace.volitionwatch.com/fsscp/]Please support FreeSpace Source Code Project[/URL]

Posted by Trivial Psychic on 05-27-2003 07:03 AM:

quote:
Originally posted by Strider
I was thinking of changing the 5 Centauri Vorchan cruisers that jump in at the last minute into various capital ships that the raiders captured and have under their control now.....

Just gotta get around the fact that puny raiders captured a narn ship, earth vessel, etc......(Certanly not a Minbari one).

I'll work it into the story (new allies or something).

So yeah.......at the end, when it looks like the Raider base was wiped out, I'll have a couple Centauri war ships jump in, a Narn capital ship, an Earth Hyperion or something.......hmm cool cool. Some Drakh too.

This will lead to my next mission where we can see Earth and their allies take on the Raiders and their new ships.

I would suggest that you use Drazi warships (once they become available in the campaign) as they are used by other races such as the Mak'Ma'Ra. They are more commercially available and likely easier for the Raiders to capture than EA or Narn warshps. But that's just my opinion.

Later!

__________________
The Trivial Psychic Strikes Again!

Posted by BabProj Team on 05-27-2003 03:14 PM:

Re: Your job- Fix this before release, right here

quote:
Originally posted by Strider
2) Can I release this with a command briefing and no normal briefing or debriefing? I cant figure those out and dont wanna learn (cause I never need em).

You are going to take heavy flak for not doing a briefing or debriefing. If you can be bothered to learn how to place a ship in FRED, then you might as well be bothered to write a mission briefing (even if its short). Its REALLY easy to do and it makes a decent mission into a good mission, a good mission into an excellent mission.

Learn it...its important.

Missions without a large number of scripted events can be fun. I know I have about 15 of them I use for TBP testing (ensuring that ships behave the way they should, numerous versus style missions, etc.). The trick is to make them feel a bit more random and player driven. You might want to experiment with that in the future (I haven't really properly started to use the 'rand' and 'variable' features that are in FRED2).

__________________
- The Babylon Project Team

Posted by Strider on 05-27-2003 06:50 PM:

Icefire, you taught me everything I KNOW with FRED2 (I was on ICQ with ya) about a year or two ago.

Except briefings. I dont get it! I added a stage and text "test 1" but nothing!

I did a debriefing. It is just true (or was it false) and has a big story thing.

__________________
"It has been my observation that if you cannot say what you mean, you can truly never mean what you say"

Babylon 5

Posted by BabProj Team on 05-27-2003 07:13 PM:

I don't remember that...but whatever

Basically briefings work like this. Add a stage (as many as you need)...use the main window underneath to setup your briefing icons (a substantially more difficult process for TBP than regular FS2) as well as the camera view. I tend to set the camera view and then click save view to be sure it saves the view.

Ignore the 'Usage Formula' area at the moment. I rarely use it and only in the case of campaigns where a different briefing is required depending on the previous missions results. Briefing music is self explanatory.

Really, just click Add Stage, click the X on the window when your done and save the mission. It is easy. No complicated procedures or event types you have to setup.

__________________
- The Babylon Project Team

Posted by Strider on 05-27-2003 08:05 PM:

The Master forgets his Padawan?!

Thanks, I just made my test briefing, I'll check it out know.

(Why is the "installation" icon a Sharlin?)

__________________
"It has been my observation that if you cannot say what you mean, you can truly never mean what you say"

Babylon 5

Posted by Xaphod_x on 05-27-2003 09:44 PM:

We needed a few more icons than were originally in FS2, and not in the same simple categories.. so (who did the icons? CptWhite? Whoever it was, good job, and I'm sorry for forgetting) had to improvise.
There's a list somewhere of how to get each icon.

__________________
Forgive my stupidity.
---
The Fish Institution
http://www.fishinstitution.com

Posted by Strider on 05-27-2003 10:37 PM:

Yeah, I figured that like.......ugh............had to look at every "freighter fighter escort" is a jumpgate icon and ****.

WELL FOLKS:

My mission is DONE!

I did a command briefing

I did a briefing (Thanks ICEFIRE)

I did a mission (Thanks to myself and....Icefire for teaching years ago)

I did messages (thanks others)

I did a debriefing (was easiest)

AND I revamped the story a bit, so hopefully I didn't ruin it for you all!

ALL I need to learn is how to change the font colour in the command briefing (So if I say "babylon 5" it is blue instead of default)......

and make the mission less hard. I play with invulnerability on and I cant even beat it hahaha.

__________________
"It has been my observation that if you cannot say what you mean, you can truly never mean what you say"

Babylon 5

Posted by BabProj Team on 05-28-2003 12:32 AM:

TO do colors...

$g (green)
$r (red)
$b (??? I think that works - blue)

So...for example. In a briefing:

Our fighter wing is stationed on $g Babylon $g 5.

__________________
- The Babylon Project Team

Posted by Strider on 05-28-2003 12:54 AM:

How do I get a message to send without seting up an event?

I just want it to send 5 seconds into the mission.......I cant figure out how unless I have it send after a ship arrives for instance.

__________________
"It has been my observation that if you cannot say what you mean, you can truly never mean what you say"

Babylon 5

Posted by Mr. Fury on 05-28-2003 04:01 AM:

Delete TBP vp files from FS2 root directory temporarily to recycle bin. Open FRED2 and select Help / Help Topics. Then select Extended Walkthrough.

That will teach you the basics. When you know the basics, you can learn the more advanced stuff.

When you have finished the extended walkthrough, restore TBP vp files back.

Really, use the FRED2 help, it is good. And check Lady Rose's TBP FRED2 tutorial, link can be found in R2 information thread.

Posted by Medic1 on 05-28-2003 04:05 AM:

quote:
Originally posted by Strider
How do I get a message to send without seting up an event?

I just want it to send 5 seconds into the mission.......I cant figure out how unless I have it send after a ship arrives for instance.

You need an event

change true to time-has-elapsed (which is under Logical)
change 0 to 5 (or whatever time in seconds you want)
then just change do-nothing to send message
place your message and your done.

Posted by Strider on 05-28-2003 06:54 AM:

Uhmmm, I did the extended walkthrough! Long time ago!

Then I did EVERY thing in the help menu except the walkthrough again. I know it all except these tiny questions.

Thanks for the colour help Icefire, and the message help Medic1. I'll fix those, try to balance the mission so it isn't impossible, then RELEASE IT in a COUPLE OF DAYS!!

You can all test my big work!!!

It is my first mission in a LONG, LONG time, so hopefully it is better than most newbies mission! Like, real impressive story, suprises, etc!

Thanks!!!

__________________
"It has been my observation that if you cannot say what you mean, you can truly never mean what you say"

Babylon 5

Posted by Mr. Fury on 05-28-2003 07:13 AM:

Well, in any case, those questions have been explained in the FRED2 help.

But it is good that here are people who have time and patience to help others out. Personally I am keeping long distance to any fred-helping because I am not good in explaining how something works or how this or that is done.

All times are EST. The time now is 07:22 AM.

Show all 18 posts from this thread on one page