Campaign Episode 2: ADAPT - Feedback thread ** SPOILER WARNING! **

[LowFlyZone 10]

In Adapt, the mission "Attention Defecit" where you need to create a distraction (Ala Night Showcase), are you supposed to have a team? Miller and Kerry make multiple references to "Your team", or "We" and whatever in the beginning of the mission. I actualy quit to come ask this question because I'm on my own with no team as in the Showcase version of the mission...

Seems like BI really screwed up the dialogue here if I'm supposed to act alone.

[h - 169]

You're supposed to have a team, I had that same issue on my first playthrough but on the second (after some patches) I had a team.

[LowFlyZone 10]

I'm playing on the latest release, maybe it's because they all died in Bingo Fuel as they were acting really stupid, much worse than usual. I ended up taking the whole map by myself with AT and a damaged Kuma MBT with working turrets! :cool:

[JerrBerr 10]

It feels like the new difficulty is not affecting campaign AI. I have both precision and skill set to 0 and enemies are still able to wing my barely visible skull from 400m away within 2-3 shots. I started the entire Adapt campaign over thinking it got messed up along the way somehow, but even in the third mission in its still happening.

[Seitan 8]

Adapt - Scouting missions are the best part of this whole campaing. In particular the missions you do at night. ArmA3 just looks fantastic. Ok it's not very realistic that you go "scouting" all by yourself at hostile terriotory. But it's way better then the main plot missions where your stupid ai comrades are trying to do anything but the things you order them to. Luckily you can just order them to stop and do everything alone. Back to scouting... Air Superriority, Weapons Dealer, Mysterious Cache... wow all great fun. So many frustrating and rewarding moments with these missions. Just when you think that you are home free you crash your truck to fence or rock. Because you are trying to avoid roads. Anyway lots of similar feelings with these few missions that i had 13 years ago when playing ofp campaign. :) Still couple missions to do in adapt i think. Before i can jump into WIN.

[TMoney 11]

Found a big issue with Attention Deficit mission. So I entered through the east side, went up the hill and cleared out the small camp. Found a Strider, loaded it up with some extra stuff and hit the roads. From there on every enemy I encountered was oblivious to me as long as I was in the truck. It was like running over sitting ducks. They seemed alerted but not one fired a single shot. Regardless it was pretty fun running people over but as a result there was no challenge.

I agree with the post above the Scouting missions are awesome! It adds so much dynamics to the campaign and lengthens it quite a bit. I'm a sucker for "side quests". More of that free roamy stuff please!

[alky_lee 276]

I have loved doing the scouting missions from Gori, then I got back to camp and found two more missions. Hellcat Down was a bit frustrating if you don't know where to look. I spent ages looking round, and it turned out to be in the last place I looked.

I did have the misfortune on the way there to come face to face with a patrol who crested a rise at the same time as I did. It didn't end well for me. But it did the next time, I made sure of that.

EDIT:

This video shows 10 ways to die and probably shows why I liked the scouting missions so much.

Edited April 9, 2014 by alky_lee

[alky_lee 276]

No change to the AI in the 1.16 update in stable branch. They struggled to keep up in Breaking Even and stayed behind to fight at the end even though I asked them nicely to come back to the camp with me. They did help out with a first aid kit when I needed one though and spot the target for me as well.

They did help a bit in Bingo Fuel before a Strider GMG removed them from this planet, but at least Kappa came through for me in the end.

Kappa actually came into the camp and engaged the enemy for me as well as taking out the Ifrit. This may be because I went round to the back of the camp to make my entrance. It made enemies much easier to spot and hit with some grenade rounds. I gave the fuel to Miller, but only because I damaged the wheels on the truck and he was closer. I must have upset him because he didn't say a word when I got back to Gori.

[lexx 1331]

I found out that the ai in the campaign is a little less annoying if you give them orders one by one. Like, if you order your team to position X but nobody moves or they are super slow-- give each of them the order and they move a lot faster and better. If I had to guess, then I'd say it's because the moment you order them all at once they try to work in a team, giving cover to each other, while sending them alone isn't doing that. It's more click work, but it helped me here and there...

[alky_lee 276]

I found out that the ai in the campaign is a little less annoying if you give them orders one by one. Like, if you order your team to position X but nobody moves or they are super slow-- give each of them the order and they move a lot faster and better. If I had to guess, then I'd say it's because the moment you order them all at once they try to work in a team, giving cover to each other, while sending them alone isn't doing that. It's more click work, but it helped me here and there...

I tried this out in Beyond Recognition today and I only lost 1 AI on the first objective and still had 2 AI left at the end of the mission so this seems to work to a certain extent.

[PeeeBeee 10]

Got back into the campaign after the last update, had to restart Adapt, which is fine, to be expected. Stuck on Supply Network. I get up to leave the staging area point just fine, get the task to set up for the ambush and then nothing happens. I usually set up in Nagales, but I have tried other places too. I've restarted the mission at least ten times. The only time I've seen the next part of the mission trigger was once when after waiting more than 15 minutes, I made a suicide run into the town west of Nagales with the off-road to be taken out by one of the APCs. A second or two before that happened the autosave and next scripted event triggered. Another time, as soon as my radio briefing on convoy ambush finished, the spotters all called in progress reports instantly and the helicopter spawned.

Anyone got any ideas? Is there some way to force the next scripted event to trigger?

[oukej 2910]

Got back into the campaign after the last update, had to restart Adapt, which is fine, to be expected. Stuck on Supply Network. I get up to leave the staging area point just fine, get the task to set up for the ambush and then nothing happens. I usually set up in Nagales, but I have tried other places too. I've restarted the mission at least ten times. The only time I've seen the next part of the mission trigger was once when after waiting more than 15 minutes, I made a suicide run into the town west of Nagales with the off-road to be taken out by one of the APCs. A second or two before that happened the autosave and next scripted event triggered. Another time, as soon as my radio briefing on convoy ambush finished, the spotters all called in progress reports instantly and the helicopter spawned.

Anyone got any ideas? Is there some way to force the next scripted event to trigger?

We are currently investigating it. Please follow in http://forums.bistudio.com/showthread.php?159710-AI-Discussion-%28dev-branch%29&p=2678645&viewfull=1#post2678645

[kye 0]

Hello all.

Having a problem from the very start. I go over to the dead person on the beach to pic up his radio as the OC is talking. Once Kerry picks it up and says he is receiving, all transmissions cease. However if I look at videos online, the OC is giving Kerry help right up to the objective.

Restarting the episode doesn't cure it. Difficulty is regular with normal AI.

Does anyone have any idea how to get things working properly?

[rübe 127]

I'm halfway through ADAPT, so there might be more feedback following. While I really like the campaign (incl. SURVIVE) and also dig the concept of guerilla warefare very much (guess resistance is my all-time favorite campaign, so...) and the optional side-missions too (why not go full dynamic/storyless(-er)?), some things really could need some improvements.

• Consistency. This is clearly the most *broken* thing, and the flaws here are absolutely annoying - even outrageous at times.
  This concerns multiple things:
  
  1. Weapon pool/ammo crates. The weapon pool is inconsistent. Weapons/ammo are going missing left and right. And any weapon that isn't in your very own hands (e.g. stored in your vehicle) will lose scopes and the like. This is very infuriating in case you've put your awesome sniper rifle aside, only to find out that you're no longer in possession of a suitable scope. Next, those stupid crates can't hold enough stuff. The ammo crate in particular is rendered completely useless: while I can take stuff from it, I can't put anything back. Thus I can't put "valuable" ammo aside. I can put ammo into other crates, but that stuff will be going missing (please no! How should I/the player know?). In the second camp there are some additional crates (e.g. where your 4-men team hangs out) but if you put stuff in it, it will be gone next time you're going to look (or if you dare to put something into their backpacks, hehe). WTF. Such things are terrible. And that other AAF guys are supposedly taking your things might sound initially funny, but remains to be a poor excuse. Please fix this. There is nothing worse than wasting time with looting awesome stuff, only to find out that it all was for nothing. pffft.
     
  2. Vehicles. They simply disappear. Which sucks as well. And vehicles on the map can only be found once? I don't get it. So for the first side-quest I'm presented with a quad within reach. I use it. Bring it back. And it's gone. Next time I have to walk. What? Why? Not cool. And what ever happend to that KAMAZ (or was it a Hemet?) I drove back? Hu? Dude! Where is my car?! :(
     
  3. Weapon load-outs/babysitting. Please don't. At least my own load-out has to remain consistent. Don't mess with it. If a main-mission requires some kind of tools, there are other ways to do it: let the player know, let him go without the needed tools (if he insists). And if such a mission absolutely needs some very specific thing, maybe there could be some (harder?) alternative in case the player forgot to bring it. But messing with the players load-out here is simply not cool. And main-missions even tend to earse everything and give you some default loadout. That's unfortunate here, with such a concept.
     

  Please - introduce a quad-tree (or whatever datastructure you think is best - maybe you could introduce some "consistency"/cache-module at some point...) and save/load all major objects, such as crates (incl. contents) and vehciles - no matter where (what are we talking about? 10000 objects maybe? How many megabytes of serialized objects? Could it be too many?). The player could really take responsibility to park his vehicles at a reasonable place. Maybe that automatic mission-ending on distance to camp isn't the best solution though; a manual "checkout" could work much better (although it's nice way to end regular missions like this - but then again it really sucks for example if the main mission just automatically starts if you walk too close to the strategic map... such things should be triggered manually).

  Next, please make more crates for the weapon pool available. If the AAF is able to hoard so many weapons and stuff, they surely will also be able to find another crate or too.. and then please save the contents of all crates in those camps. Having functional crates there that won't be saved is just nuts. :/

  [*]Transportation/load. This one really bugs me (most likely a config thingy, not really specific for this campaign, but still....). How come I can only put like 3 backpacks into a super large truck? It looks like a stupid quad bike can hold more stuff than that. This renders missions like "Abandonned battlefield" et al. a bit stupid. I can't really collect the stuff there. All I can take is maybe a weapon or two and some ammo. Wow. Why? Something here is terribly wrong. Maybe it's time that we'd be able to load trucks with crates/material that does *not* go into the vehicles inventory?

  [*]Team-management. Has been already noted here multiple times: it would have been way more fun if - just like in resistance - you would have to manage your team - maybe not all of AAF, but at least some guys that you could take with you for a walk (i.e. side-missions). Further there was the aspect of your guys gaining experience, and if they'd die, they'd be replaced (up to some point) by new, unexperienced guys. Such a thing would have been really lovely.

  [*]Consequences. Are there any? I feel like all the side-quest I do have absolutely no purpose (especially since the weapon pool thingy doesn't really work). IMHO this is a missed opportunity: side-missions should have consequences you'll notice in main-missions. Most obvious concept would be to make them easier if some side-mission has been successfully done earlier - which is cool, because it allows you to play the main-missions with different difficulty (or just shorter/longer or even completely different), if you want. But really, lot of ideas would be easily possible, if side-missions would set some global campaign variables, that would trigger things (or not) in main-missions. Alternative endings could be opened. Do that helo-sabotage mission first, and then, maybe you could successfully loot that stupid supply truck (that otherwise will get blown to pieces no matter what...grrr). Side-missions should be more than just decoration/a bit of variation, really.

  And yeah, I have to agree with the guys that whish for more missions that could actually be "won". Best example is that "supply truck" mission. Why not make it an option? Succeed and have fun with the new toys, or don't and carry on nevertheless. Resistance had a very similar mission, and it was awesome to drive that truck back home and be able to use the new stuff (not sure if you could finish the mission without succeeding; but I think such a thing was possible with a later smuggler mission? Never mind...).

  [*]Civilians. I don't think I have seen a single civilian person on Stratis or on Altis. That's just odd. And again a missed opportunity, especially for guerilla warefare and as a central element for many missions. Civilians were crucial in OFP, in Resistance, (never played Arma1) and even in Arma2. Heck, in Arma2 so much was about civilians (just think of manhattan). Civilians can really add so much variety to missions. Traitors, hostages, informants, smugglers, family, ... Yet in Arma3 that element is completely absent. That's just sad. :(

I hope this didn't sound too harsh (I love you guys ). Overall I really enjoy the campaign; and Arma3 itself (simply gorgeous). But I feel like not enough time has been devoted to these campaign episodes. Which is a bit of a shame. Compared to Arma2, this stuff is clearly far more "gamey" - which does not have to be a bad thing at all. But if gamey, please make it a seamless experience; yeah, why not borrow the one or other idea from GTA and the like if you go this route for a campaign.. (guess I'd have more patience for missing stuff in the far more serious Arma2 setting, haha).

if you leave camp via the road, they placed vehicles for you to use

Wait, what?

oO

EDIT:

So after todays update (haven't been playing the dev-branch) there is a useable quad and a jeep with 3 men ready for patrol missions in Gori. The following map selection is also neat. That's pretty awesome already! Side missions really make way more fun, if you can bring some company along (What happens if they die? Are they gone forever? Will they be replaced? Is their loadout consistent? - haven't returned from my first side-mission with company yet, so...).

This also makes looting somewhat easier, although it can be quite a hassle to make AI open their inventory exactly where you want them to.

My ammo box is still full, such that I can't put anything back... Have to check, if things still are going missing otherwise.

Thanks for the update.

Much appreciated. :n:

Edited June 18, 2014 by ruebe

[alky_lee 276]

I just finished the campaign today (before the update) and then find that it's been updated with major changes to the scouting missions in Adapt with the addition of vehicles and AI teams to use as well as saving vehicles and inventory at the hubs. Looks like I will have to try the scouting missions again, perhaps with a few mods now I don't have to play the story missions.

[enex 11]

No mods, latest dev branch: Mission Network (you start with british

squad, you break off towards drop of point (hide your vehicle) and

then you move to pick up rebel fighters which you control first time

in campaign.Mission is to set up ambush position.

Everytime AI convoy passes second town (second spotter) they got

stuck on the wall holding whole convoy for indefinitely.Decreases

Fun factor and may cause lot of frustration.

Can be more detailed if necessary, with my description but it takes

10min to go in game and play out the mission.

Additional high shed building which holds banged up car

gives out control of car (unlocked) only after brits end

up their radio conversation.

[krycek 349]

Kinda late to the show,but I just finished Adapt now.So far I like the campaign which says something.After OFP campaign and the first few missions in A2(before turning into Warfare) I actually thought it was an exception that BI got the OFP one so good,but enough about past.

The story so far is intriguing and I especially loved the stealth missions,great voice acting too.What I didn't like:

-the secondary missions,they serve no purpose beyond some extra gear.2-3 were enough to get what I needed,the rest were borefests and extra filler.Would have been nice if they tied in with the story(like fewer enemies) or the guys you have with you actually keeping the gear I got for them.

-the AI,very hit&miss,sometimes I had to lower the difficulty because I was getting hit by Terminators(God forbid you to carry an RPG,you light up as a beacon for those AI gunners).This brings me to the next point,with lowered difficulty the AI was hit by Stupiditus Extremus and I was actually seeing firefights between my guys and enemies at 75-100m without anyone hitting anything.I can understand the guerrillas but pro army like CSAT?!So I had to raise the difficulty again and so on,basically a vicious circle.The "all sides difficulty setting" does more harm than good.

-the damage system,I like that enemies don't drop from one-shot anymore but c'mon,4 bullets in a guy and he still manages to take me out and this wasn't a rare thing

-some weird things in campaign,in many missions I noticed enemy hardware lying around,especially MRAPs or an APC around,why aren't the guerrillas capturing this superior gear and instead relying on pickups and atvs?!

Not to mention as guerrillas you could cause chaos by taking these vehicles and ambush enemies thinking a friendly vehicle approaches them.Or that it would actually be safer to travel in these vehicles,what a patrol will look for in the distance,one of their MRAPs or some weird camo pickup with a bunch of dudes in the back?

-no civies,understandable on Stratis,but on Altis too?At least a few scattered around especially in big towns.

-lastly I know this is about content,but it seems everyone and their dog in Altis has a pickup

-this one is actually funny,I have to thank the animals because not once they stumbled into mines,for example in the One Shot One Kill side mission.

I heard a bunch of explosions only to see some dead chickens around,true patriots I tell you.Or in Within Reach some sheeps blew up some mines on the hill I was on,saved my life because I didn't had a mine detector on me.I think snakes do that too,if I was AAF I was marking the animals to helping the enemy.:D

Edited October 18, 2014 by Krycek

[froggyluv 2130]

Never played full campaign but gearin up for it now fully modded up! As far as I remember, there was some really excellent voice acting and decent scenarios but the lack of civilians was almost jarring. TPW's addon is a definite must add-on but even that is not the same as creating a fully flushed cultural feel and atmosphere. Altis a great big beautiful island no doubt but without actual people, women, furniture etc there is just a huge vacuum that creates a feeling like you aren't fighting in a real environment which is a shame. I honestly have no idea why even a smattering of civilians with basic routines and the random car wasn't even attempted, it's as if they were scared that somehow it would make the mission result unstable but in the end it creates a more stale and hollow feel. Praying the expansion makes up for this with a fully flushed out culture, civilians that really match the locale and a generally more 'lived in' feel.

[chortles 263]

it's as if they were scared that somehow it would make the mission result unstable but in the end it creates a more stale and hollow feel.

Considering that this is why there's no co-op campaign...

[Tonci87 163]

Never played full campaign but gearin up for it now fully modded up! As far as I remember, there was some really excellent voice acting and decent scenarios but the lack of civilians was almost jarring. TPW's addon is a definite must add-on but even that is not the same as creating a fully flushed cultural feel and atmosphere. Altis a great big beautiful island no doubt but without actual people, women, furniture etc there is just a huge vacuum that creates a feeling like you aren't fighting in a real environment which is a shame. I honestly have no idea why even a smattering of civilians with basic routines and the random car wasn't even attempted, it's as if they were scared that somehow it would make the mission result unstable but in the end it creates a more stale and hollow feel. Praying the expansion makes up for this with a fully flushed out culture, civilians that really match the locale and a generally more 'lived in' feel.

^this

In Arma 2 you had all kinds of civilians walking and driving around. Everytime you came into a village it felt alive (especially in user made missions) wich is absolutely not the case with Arma 3. And even if you use mods to add civilians you still only get male tourists in their mid 20ties.

[dragon01 902]

I agree. While lack of women might be excusable on technical grounds (there's a mod in development for them, and given the sheer amount of work involved, I can see why BI didn't chose to include them), what little is there of the civilian faction is vastly underused. ArmA2 had superior atmosphere to 3, it really managed to feel alive, with elders, women, priests and all the other ordinary inhabitants populating the world and trying to go about their business. None of this is present on Altis, which is a shame. It has a lot of abandoned cars, but Chernarus had just as many ones that actually worked, and were even quite diverse. ArmA3 only has a few trucks, 3 normal cars (awfully similar looking, at that) and a pickup.