[SP] Pilgrimage

[Rydygier 1302]

"Dev branch" updated to 1.81c beta:

- locals now may sometimes comment the player by 3D text;

- reputation system affecting in the complex way chance for useful intel from asked people and altering kind of comments and reaction of locals on the Alex presence;

- Alex' companions may now rarely comment currently visited town depending on player's reputation on place;

- reduced amount of the tanks in the tank groups, in most cases to only 1 machine. Only vanilla tank groups affected;

- increased average distance of AC activities from the player (a bit lower chance to be involved into AC);

- rare, additional "big battles in towns" for AC, with flare signals if at night; (meant as really rare. Few times per gameplay at most, rather not more)

- "mad" UGV now more active - should patrol surrounding area if no targets in range;

- added NVGoggles for "Better Gear" difficulty mode (good for people wanting to start at midnight, I guess);

- excluded from the populating pool groups with UGV;

- actions added by the mission code now have different color than default;

- AC code improvements;

- various code improvements.

As for 3D comment for the locals - it is meant as immersive indicator of reputation, but also as eyecandy improving the fun in the way, it was in the old, good Fallout 1&2 games. Shouldn't be often thing, unless reputation in given area is extreme. I'm open for language corrections and/or propositions of more sentences. Serious and humorous.

I spend some time to balance well reputation system and its influence, still I'm open on any opinions or suggestions for amendments. In general - do not kill civilians, avoid collateral casaulties, and all will be OK. The higher reputation level above 0, the better chance for some intel and lesser risk of misleading informations. Also more people may want to talk. Vice versa for highly negative reputation. However there is no reputation, that would prevent completelly from getting intel from the locals. Same, even very high reputation will not guarantee useful data. Influence of this factor is meant to be noticeable, but not higher, than moderate. If this isn't that way - report, please.

Actions color - this is only my proposition. If anyone see reasons, why this should be different color - I'll consider his opinion.

Quite a few new code lines this time, so all beta users should have eyes open on any signs of "brand new" bugs around introduced things.

Edited May 16, 2014 by Rydygier

[teoleo 2]

how rearm a Hunter or a tank?

[Rydygier 1302]

Only one way: find an ammo truck as one of empty vehicles. These are randomized, so there may be no even single such vehicle on map (or may be several such vehicles as well). Better just save veh's ammo - save it for situations, where you have no other choice, than using it.

[neofit 65]

I haven't tried the reputation system yet. In previous versions, civilians with blue markers rarely spoke to me, and in the rare occasions that they did, I got a vague direction as to where to look. I am not really interested in being given directions actually, I have officers for that, I was hoping that civilians would give me some mission. More side missions (like in Domination for instance) = win! I feel that there is not enough killing going on in this game :). So, again, I suppose that I was just unlucky, but what's the probability to receive a mission compared to their usual "look that-a way, gringo"?

[Rydygier 1302]

Mission is rare thing. It is dependent on Circle Intel setting (as it provides such intel when job is done). It is always 0% if circle intel is disabled/"warlords only" mode. Otherwise - 2% for "rare", 5% for "average" and 10% for "frequent". Now also reputation has influence on this, if basic chance is above 0%. While negative reputation can reduce chance for the mission seriously (up to 75% probablity, so code will exit before test for actual chance, and up to -1.5% for basic chance), positive values may raise chance for the mission, but only up to 1.5%. So, in total, range is 0-11.5%.

Also I could consider adding another kind of side missions, but need reasonable and suitable for such kind of gameplay ideas.

[ebarstad 18]

Also I could consider adding another kind of side missions, but need reasonable and suitable for such kind of gameplay ideas.

I don't know if you play RPGs at all, but often they have different quest/mission types that might work here:

- Delivery missions: You have to take a vehicle (or something) to a specific location and drop it off.

- Escort missions: You have to get a person to a specific location without him dying.

- Fetch missions: Find something and bring it back to the person (this might be too much like an MMO).

- Clear an area of enemies or help defend an area.

[Belbo 461]

- Escort missions: You have to get a person to a specific location without him dying.

No... nononono... no... nooooooo...

Please, no escort missions. Until now I have never found a way to understand the reasoning behind putting escort missions into games.

The other ideas were pretty well though. ;)

Additional ideas:

- steal something (like a suitcase, a vehicle, a weapon)

- place an item at a specific location (more like a dead drop than a delivery)

- kill the sniper (like the one in Adapt)

- help with an ambush on a vehicle convoi

- scout an area and report the units present (with a penalty if you don't give the right amount of enemies/the right classes of enemy units)

- participate in a race (against time, as AI can't drive...)

- establish radio relays at specific key locations

- destroy a vehicle/item/house

- probably even some more. Always depends on feasibility and how much it detracts from the main mission.

[rsoftokz 288]

- scout an area and report the units present (with a penalty if you don't give the right amount of enemies/the right classes of enemy units)

that's a pretty good idea!

I think additionnal missions must stay " logical " comparing to the main mission (get brother's body ) and in regard of the operation theatre environnement.

Alex is supposed to be on an island where war is ravaging towns and people. As told in the official campaign, civilian might have entered in resistance so we can imagine Alex might get in touch with them and might be needed for "covert operations" such as getting intel about enemies for the resistance benefit.

but when writing those words, I'm just realizing we are "re-writing" the story of the campain.

Pilgrimage is a very cool game, with a pretty original idea.

getting it better is a fair idea too and for now, all updates made bring a real value to the original idea and story.

but there is a moment where the wish of being "better" can bring things to worse finally.

is there really a need to "bring" new things to the mission unless a more realistic environnement ????

I like the idea to start randomly somewhere with less equipment and growing in strengh by finding/capturing items from the opposite side to accomplish your goal (there is a mini campain like this where you start as War Prisonner and someone blow the prison walls then you have to escape, find guns and equipment for you and your team, growing in strengh to fight the enemies).

searching across all the island to find intel and finaly your brother is a very smart way to explore the map (almost when you don't play MP with Arma for some reasons and you only like to play SP)

so maybe things to add might be:

-way to sell captured vehicules (to the resistance if there is one )

-way to buy some needed items (like specific ammo for some specific weapons you found w/o propper ammo )

-need to find food/drink (like DayZ concept) to keep your health level

-need to get some rest sometimes to keep your mind clear and health good (I imagine it could be possible to do, but I don't really know, I'm in lack of knowledge about Arma missions programming )

-way to get some ammo for your vehicle (a few ones) from captured vehicles (I never found such thing from Arma but I think it is possible to do so captured vehicle can be considered like a ammobox I guess - I never really surch for a mod like this either )

-way to finally hack the "mad ugv " (is there somewhere a compatible drone terminal to find ?? ) and turn it against one side of opposants.

anyway, as told before, all depends of what can be done and how much it detracts from original mission and goal.

thanks again for this mission (my exclusive and only mission on arma for weeks now ;) )

Edited May 17, 2014 by rsoftokz

[Rydygier 1302]

I don't know if you play RPGs at all, but often they have different quest/mission types that might work here:

- Delivery missions: You have to take a vehicle (or something) to a specific location and drop it off.

- Escort missions: You have to get a person to a specific location without him dying.

- Fetch missions: Find something and bring it back to the person (this might be too much like an MMO).

- Clear an area of enemies or help defend an area.

I'm playing RPGs. A lot. Still, most of usual RPG-like tasks doesn't fit Pilgrimage too well.

Delivery - could be. As the rare occasion to turn a vehicle into ff. This may be only for specific vehicle or any, where price depends on kind of vehicle.

Escort - never liked that kind of mission. In most cases, I tried to complete such tasks, escorted person died quickly and I couldn't do anything about. Also I forsee number of technical complications.

Fetch - mission with "bringing back to a person" missions not possible, as civilians are removed from the map as soon player go far enough. If he return there, he we'll no meet that person anymore.

Clear - The problem, I see for now, is fact, so such cleansing will be temporary, as new AI groups may come there, not mention about AC, that in fact makes whole idea futile.

Additional ideas:

- steal something (like a suitcase, a vehicle, a weapon)

- place an item at a specific location (more like a dead drop than a delivery)

- kill the sniper (like the one in Adapt)

- help with an ambush on a vehicle convoi

- scout an area and report the units present (with a penalty if you don't give the right amount of enemies/the right classes of enemy units)

- participate in a race (against time, as AI can't drive...)

- establish radio relays at specific key locations

- destroy a vehicle/item/house

- probably even some more. Always depends on feasibility and how much it detracts from the main mission.

Stealing - no proper mechanics, no real opportunities to steal anything from anybody. Also bit too far from the plot. Alex is not a thief. Killer - of course, but not a thief...

Place - as vehicle delivery - possible. Alex would receive what, and where to drop. Both things may be randomized. But this should be rather an object, not a weapon (weapon isn't a standalone object, left on ground is in fact a weaponholder, which is same, whatever you drop)

Kill sniper - Hmm. Possible. Even I have at hand a bit of nasty code from Arma 2 times for sneaky sniper positioning. Perhaps... Of course such sniper must be spawned dynamically, to low probability for regular sniper team near. Would be "nice" also to make that sniper shoot at civilians. If only doable easy enough.

Ambush - whom to help? For that I should introduce whole new partisan faction of West side. I do not want this. Also convoys are tricky to maintain due to "great" AI driving skills. I would like to avoid features, that relies on such AI skills.

Scout - Again, scouting for who? The only chance, I see is online ordering of such "service" eg as "outsourcing" by some intelligence agency. Doable, but doesn't fit the plot too well. Alex is busy with very personal matters, rather doesn't look for PMC contracts right now. But I'll consider that one. Additional condition to make it challenging - without beeing detected by scouted forces.

race - :D please...

- radio relays - 1. someone must wantthis for a reason. What reason? And again - who? Agency of some sort? 2. Then, must deliver the relays to set. Paradrop? An agent under cover? All doable, but too far from the story, I'm affraid. It isn't kind of job, any serious intelligence would outsource like that. IMO.

- destroy something - doable, so perhaps. I would think mostly about buildings here (at last some real use for satchels and such...). Also moral dilemma due to possible civilian presence (+ reputation impact in such case). Could be nice. But again - as another online offer.

Thanks, guys, as we can see, not so easy, but we got something promising: vehicle delivery (locals), scouting (online offer), sniper to neutralize (locals), blowing up something (online). These four. I could start with this after the weekend. Also I would like to figure out something new too. One idea for now - collecting and online transfer of requested amount of ff for someone, who need to pay a ransom, buy very expensive medicines etc. Plain financial help for the locals in troubles. Good for reputation too. And easy to implement. :)

[rsoftokz 288]

... I would like to figure out something new too. One idea for now - collecting and online transfer of requested amount of ff for someone, who need to pay a ransom, buy very expensive medicines etc. Plain financial help for the locals in troubles. Good for reputation too. And easy to implement. :)

so selling captured vehicles might help to collect a large amount of FF to pay ransom or buy expensive items (like special weapons you'll be able to buy then: Thermal scope, heavy sniper weapons, etc...) or simply give money to locals to increase reputation level.

(we can imagine people to buy food, medics and much more needed on a civilian war theatre )

[Rydygier 1302]

but there is a moment where the wish of being "better" can bring things to worse finally.

Yes, that's fair point, and certainly I would avoid turning quite coherent story into something too blurry, like random secops one by one. If there will be such tasks - not as something frequent. On the contrary - this must stay rare, it is a spice, not a meal. And again, no partisan faction will be introduced.

-way to sell captured vehicules (to the resistance if there is one )

Not all the time, not for the resistance (but perhaps for the locals, that are preparing to be a resistance in the future, that would give good reason for such needs) but could be as mentioned "deliver a vehicle" task.

-way to buy some needed items (like specific ammo for some specific weapons you found w/o propper ammo )

I do not like this.

1. complicated - most probably to make it reasonable I must design whole GUI system for selling/buying, just for this single thing.

2. Spoils a challenge of obtaining, what is needed on your own.

-need to find food/drink (like DayZ concept) to keep your health level

Rather not. Again - custom GUI most probably needed, and whole new class of the loot etc. And all only to make the pilgrimage more arduous. Also mission takes, I don't know, up to 20 hours. We can easily assume, so water is easy enough to obtain if we have whole towns of enterable houses, same for food, but this even shouldn't be necessary - mission is too short to make such need reasonable. "Too DayZ" for me anyway.

-need to get some rest sometimes to keep your mind clear and health good (I imagine it could be possible to do, but I don't really know, I'm in lack of knowledge about Arma missions programming )

Implementing clarity of the mind... Hmm. :) Post process effects? Fatigue alteration? Nah. See above. Too short this mission is. And in fact you can rest to skip the time and heal the wounds at hideout's fireplace.

-way to get some ammo for your vehicle (a few ones) from captured vehicles (I never found such thing from Arma but I think it is possible to do so captured vehicle can be considered like a ammobox I guess - I never really surch for a mod like this either )

Hmm. At least reasonable. I mean - it should be possible, as it is possible in RL. Also probably will not spoil too much aspect of rarity of proper vehicle ammo. If I find the way to script this properly - why not. But no promises. This may be too tricky/too heavy for CPU/whatever.

-way to finally hack the "mad ugv " (is there somewhere a compatible drone terminal to find ?? ) and turn it against one side of opposants.

Yes, I know, I didn't forget. I think, that's the only thing apart from destroying, Alex may want to do with UGV - to hack it (for disable or make it choose enemies only amongst real hostiles). There are some terminals to obtain, but rare. Good idea.

---------- Post added at 09:27 ---------- Previous post was at 09:15 ----------

Hmm. I'm still thinking about the resistance aspect. I really do not want to introduce such faction as permanent force to interact with. But what if Alex could make real difference out there by not only selling vehicles, but also giving the loot instead of selling it online (just another action at loot boxes)? That would do two things: boost reputation and, in time, will give a chance (depending, what and how much of it he gave actually) to appear some partisan groups fighting against AAF and CSAT? Not sure, if as permanent groups, rather not due to performance issues, but on the basis similar to AC, only not so intense and also if AC in current mode is disabled (another AC mode to make it customizable?). Not sure, perhaps this is wrong for some reason, must think more about that. For me would be really cool watching, as my actions really matters. What do you think, people?

Edited May 17, 2014 by Rydygier

[neofit 65]

Mission is rare thing. It is dependent on Circle Intel setting (as it provides such intel when job is done). It is always 0% if circle intel is disabled/"warlords only" mode.

Oh, I remember complaining before the setting for "Warlords Only" green circles was put in place, that I was getting too many circles, from CP and other officers in the field. That was indeed too much info, but IMHO it makes a bit more sense to allow them from civilians. I'm not sure if some guy at a chekpoint should know about the brother, but a civilian may have known him.

Hmm. I'm still thinking about the resistance aspect. I really do not want to introduce such faction as permanent force to interact with. But what if Alex could make real difference out there by not only selling vehicles, but also giving the loot instead of selling it online (just another action at loot boxes)?

I am not one to want less features in a mod, since I am not the one putting in the effort to implement them, but IMHO we are losing focus here. That's way too much stuff to interact with just to find the brother's body, and may be better left for a new mod?

Even all this civilian reputation thingy seems too much, no? Sure, I did complain that they were not talking to me, but from a realism viewpoint only, here they are showing off their blue marker, I have a gun, but nooooo, they won't talk to me. But they are not important to the mission. I think I played about 10 missions from beginning to end with various settings, and every time but once I finished within a single game day (and that other time was before the introduction of the freeable medic teammate, I wanted to get healed to stop the wounded breathing sounds, so I passed some time at the hideout).

The mission was already quite rich and streamlined before the civilian reputation system. A few more features and we will have a new version of "Whole Lotta Altis" :). I imagine what I'd do in the mission with the possibility to get green circles from civilians or try and sell cars or weapons to the resistance for circles, but it seems to much work. I'll just go do the airfields and strongholds as before, there is action in each and it seems more fun. Maybe it will be better if you left this advanced and refined reputation system as well as interactions with the resistance for this new dynamic mercenary mission that was hinted at a few pages ago? :)

[Rydygier 1302]

Perhaps indeed, as for more tasks and equipping resistance... Yes, I think you're right. These ideas are great, but I fully understood, what means to many things to do at a time, so I'll do nothing, cause can't decide, what should I choose and I'm lost a bit. Kinda Skyrim syndrome. So these will be kept for another mission on Pilgrimage platform. This may be even a sequel. Alex was on Altis for the body, and during that search he saw, what is going on there, so next time he is back with more ambitious task blah blah.

Reputation however in current form isn't a big deal as for complexicity from the user side. Just do not be so careless about killing civilians, becuase it, logically, lowers chance for useful intel from them. That's all, what it changes for user actions. Rest is, as was, same, just you can see sometimes a comment about you (eyecandy), and the more hostiles you kill, the better chance for good intel, but this isn't any complication for the player. So, I think, what is implemented, it stays, including reputation, as last major feature. I also have a feeling, Pilgrimage already is filled enough with goodies.

So, for know, I have to do:

- gettting vehicle ammo from another vehicle (if easy enough to implement);

- option of hacking the UGV instead of destroying it using UAV terminal;

- perhaps some less makeshift way to delete shift+clicked waypoints.

Edited May 17, 2014 by Rydygier

[Belbo 461]

Ambush - whom to help? For that I should introduce whole new partisan faction of West side.

That might relate to all those problems of motivation and agency: You wouldn't necessarily need to narratively create a new faction. Altis is in a state of chaos in your mission, you could always fall back on local criminals and blackmailing. "If you don't help us with this or that, we'll might just kill this or that/give informations about you to CSAT/go after you/etc."

But these side tasks would always have to bring the plot forward of course. So if you do something for somebody, it has to bring you closer to your brother's body, that's clear.

Another idea of mine, I don't know if it has been mentioned yet, would be to choose not only at which coast you spawn in the beginning, but to have the option to randomly paradrop over the island (like you hired a private plane to drop you off over the island. Afterwards you would have to finde a boat by yourself to get the body of your brother off of the island.)

[Rydygier 1302]

Paradrop - yep, I think you just gave me nice idea for insertion for the sequel, we are talking a bit above. Even if highly overused. Sometimes I had feeling, so every mission have to begin from HALO or at least via chopper insertion... I could understand this though, it is "attractive&cool" way of insertion for sure.

[Belbo 461]

Paradrop - yep, I think you just gave me nice idea for insertion for the sequel, we are talking a bit above. Even if highly overused. Sometimes I had feeling, so every mission have to begin from HALO or at least via chopper insertion... I could understand this though, it is "attractive&cool" way of insertion for sure.

Yeah, that was my concern too. But the problem is: How else, beside fancy-schmancy-teleporting would you narratively explain a starting position that's not at the coast? Another option would be a helo-insertion, but how rich is the player really? :D Alternatively you could start off in medias res with the player already being on the island and just getting the news that his brother has died. Or whatever the plot of the sequel will be. ;)

[Rydygier 1302]

Plot of the sequel not sure yet.

I have some rough ideas only. I would like to avoid making just "Pilgrimage bis". I would like to provide something with own, unique flavour, not the same again, just with secops and another goal.

One of possible course of events: by some political twist AAF, conflicted with CSAT, managed to dominate Altis, and forced CSAT to withdraw. For now. Currently AAF wants to strengthen control over the Altis. While AAF is still very weak and far from control, there is a window of opportunity, pro-western local powers plan to exploit. As for Alex, he does not care about all this political shit, but has own, personal reason (he met someone before on Alits? A woman? BTW where are women, Arma devs? Not sure yet) to help just emerging resistance against AAF by doing variety of operations, looting etc. with some support of western intelligence. NATO is avoiding direct engagement, so preffer to use PMCs, like Alex, as kind of outsourcing. Alex uses that opportunity to reach own goals using NATO resources - agreement of mutual benefits, although in fact both sides of this agreement do not care about reasons of the other side.

His goal, as trusted military advisor of newly established pro-western gov, is to defeat AAF faction and in the meantime prepare defensive forces of Altis for inevitable return of CSAT, that will try to strike in the most suitable moment, just after defeat of AAF (or resistance). It is up to his actions and decisions, how many groups Altis will provide against second CSAT invasion. As for "the final battle", I would see role here for my Hetman script, controlling both sides. Who will be the winner? No one knows that.

For now something like this. All may be changed completely though. Any opinions? Ideas?

Edited May 17, 2014 by Rydygier

[pvt. partz 248]

.......or scuba,....for something slightly less used?

[kavoriken 1]

Hi and first of all: Great mission, i'm having a blast playing it.

Got some suggestions regarding hardcore though: I prefer playing hardcore, mainly because of not having a map at the start. The problem is that getting a map is very easy by just murdering a random civilian. Is it possible to remove maps/compasses/Gps from all or at least some of the civilians inventories? Personally i think hardcore would make a lot more sense if a map is obtainable by looting houses but rather difficult to find. If removing maps from the inventory is impossible, maybe add at least add some sort of consequence for killing civilians like either the military being alarmed and starting to look for you in that area or some sort of insanity "debuff" that makes your sight blurry for a couple of minutes.

Edit: And btw. everytime i spawn with the mk20c my sound is gone entirely. Tried it with all mods deactivated, but keeps happening.

Edited May 17, 2014 by Kavoriken

[Rydygier 1302]

Starting from the 1.81 beta consequence of killing civilian is serious reputation drop. However removing maps etc. should be easy.

Edit: And btw. everytime i spawn with the mk20c my sound is gone entirely. Tried it with all mods deactivated, but keeps happening.

Mk20c is default weapon of this unit. It normally is removed and replaced by another weapon so player never should get/see mk20c at start. If you do, then for some reason something breaks initial code in your case. How often it happens? Usually "no sound" issue is caused by spawning units of somehow invalid/specific config from custom mods under initial loading screen. Sometimes it happens also on vanilla, beginning from Arma 3 1.16. At this update they had to change/break something, that sometimes causes that. In such case just restart. I couldn't do anything about that, as this isn't script error (apparently nothing on my end).

[giorgygr 61]

If you do, then for some reason something breaks initial code in your case.

To be honest it happened once for me also.

It's really strange :/

[rsoftokz 288]

Edit: And btw. everytime i spawn with the mk20c my sound is gone entirely. Tried it with all mods deactivated, but keeps happening.

It happened to me several times: the matter is the mission then is really LOOOONNNNGGGGGG to start and your PC so very slow for some reasons I didn't identify for sure but to me it was "too much" mods activated and most of time with AllInArma running.

each time I played the mission with Arma3 w/o any mod or with a few ones, the matter disappeared.

when you start the mission, and it seems to do so "no sound and MK20", just wait for a few minutes all what is needed for Pilgrimage to start , depending to all of your mods activated and then MK20 will be replaced, sound will be back and all would be fine.

All In Arma is great but for this mission , by my own experience, it is a source of failures.

[kurtz1 10]

How about this ...

Insertion is by OH1 helo to 1 of 3 LZ's (Whiskey, Zulu, Xray) on the same side of the island. The LZ's are marked on your map before the start.

After finding the body you call for extraction. The pilot responds with a random pick of a LZ. When you reach the LZ you call again and shortly after the helo arrives. If the LZ is hot, the helo won't land and returns to base . You have to clear the area and repeat the process and take a chance that the pilot may pick a different LZ. The mission is over when the helo is "feet wet". Should you get shot down over the island, well too bad.

[Rydygier 1302]

A transport chopper to Alex' disposal nor any other exotic way of insertion/extraction doesn't fit Pilgrimage's plot nor my vision of this mission. As for the sequel - do not know yet.

[neofit 65]

I had an idea about a sequel by the end of my very first playthrough. I was making so much money by anonymously selling loot that I was thinking "ok little brother, I'll bring you home and I'm coming back asap for more or that insane money" :).

You are good at making dynamic content, you should capitalize on that. The heart of the mission should be dynamically generated tasks. Like the patrol tasks we have during the official campaign (the best part imho). Or like Insurgency Generator, only this generates a string of non-related missions, but it would be nice to have the same within the framework of a persistent world.

I like the sound of the player getting in touch with the resistance against the AAF. As a private citizen though, not NATO (let's be serious, there is no oil on Altis). Then maybe a string of missions to seize locations, until full liberation, for example. Like in Domination, I don't know if you played this mod in Arma3 or the previous versions. Not like DUWS or the Whole Lotta's, it's a mess with tons of ambient allied units doing their own thing, where you are like a cog, this kind of gameplay is covered. We're not fighting CSAT and the superpowers it represents, but the AAF - a local faction with limited means. So a Domination-like (or Evolution-like) progression would make sense, with your group or 2-3 rebel groups attacking a town, with "seize town X" missions, and side missions, like assassinations, destroy tank repair factory, sabotage airfield at night, etc., until a 40-man boss fight in the capital, and Freedom!

Or maybe the player is only a mercenary, getting contracts to kill and destroy, and other criminals deeds. Maybe, depending on what he will be doing, some factions will like him more and others less. The player gets higher in grade, etc. I like what is being done in M.E.R.C., but it is all scripted, done in a couple of hours or an evening and forgotten. The same would be awesome with dynamic missions (and a less silly premise on how it all started :) ). How to end it, I don't know, maybe it ends when the player has enough and wants to start over. When do highly paid criminals get enough?

It would be nice if factions could be dynamic. I am currently playing a 1.81c with High AC and "African Conflict", and it's the funniest one ever. I am about 4 hours in, I have seen maybe a couple of CSAT and a couple of AAF teams. The rest, about 90% of the troops, are African Government and Rebel forces shooting at each other and every other local military they see. I like how Pilgrimage does this, if the mod doesn't break everything, the troops will be integrated seamlessly, without the need to manually change the mission. So if "Pilgrimage 2: the Return of the Vengeance" will have factions whose position towards the player will change, maybe it would be interesting to code it from the start so they can dynamically include new factions from mods?

Or... I am waiting for a game like Fort Zombie (but written by competent people), that would allow one to build a base, gather survivors, food, weapons, etc. We don't need zombies for this though. What if Alex or, forget him, a local guy, wanted to start a resistance movement against the AAF. If we think a little, nothing like that, nor 90% of the stock campaign would be technically possible: a couple of choppers with IR and thermal sights would show all rebels camps in the forest like on the palm of your hand. But let's imagine we are in a world like Falling Skies where even aliens don't have this technology nor the brains to use it. So our guy and a couple of friends make a guerilla camp that they will build up during the mission, maybe on a small island or peninsula. They need to go find food, weapons, ammo, vehicles, the mission generates side-missions to attack some locations, they recruit people by freeing them or some appear if their faction is high enough, etc.

Or screw freedom and pink unicorns for a change. Me and two buddies create a criminal syndicate, build the base, get missions to destroy competing gangs, go steal stuff and weapons, sell them on the market, until we have enough people and money to do a coup in the capital and change our name to AAF. Survive, Adapt, Win Episode 1.

But maybe before all this, a quick port of Pilgrimage to Stratis and other maps?

---------- Post added at 13:39 ---------- Previous post was at 13:32 ----------

A transport chopper to Alex' disposal nor any other exotic way of insertion/extraction doesn't fit Pilgrimage's plot nor my vision of this mission. As for the sequel - do not know yet.

I think people don't want to jog for 15+ minutes until they reach civilization. I too keep forgetting that there is this "Hitch hiking" option in the menu. It is usually enough to reach the first city. If 3K is not enough, maybe the initial money allotment could be increased to 5K or 10K, or the first hitchhiking can be made free, that would make it close enough to a HALO jump. But I too think that someone who can afford a helo insertion and extraction into another country, at war, in the middle of the Mediterranean, is powerful enough to have sent an elite team of PMCs instead of risking his own life :).