[SP Campaign] M.E.R.C.S. - mercenary expendable ruthless covert selfish

[miromanu 10]

Well, if you didn't get any phonecalls yet you have missed one laptop. Have you been to the small junkyard at the first set of binary coordinates at 058124? He will call you once you found all laptops. Before that he's not at the garage (but still on the map somewhere observing your progress).

ok thx i've missed the laptop an that grid that was the problem :)

[IndeedPete 1038]

Just popped out a small update!

Changelog

0.93 Beta - 21.10.2014

• FIXED: Badass One, Finally nailed down the crash bug (hopefully).
  
• FIXED: Randomisation scripts affected Nikos in some cases.
  
• FIXED: Transport heli was still full of free stuff.
  
• FIXED: Shop System, glasses were not listed.
  
• CHANGED: Home Sweet Home, Raif is now an engineer to be able to fix vehicles.
  
• CHANGED: Home Sweet Home, autoheal after returning to hub.
  

Download

Addon Version

Dropbox v0.93 BETA

Steam Workshop v0.93 BETA

Campaign PBO Version

Dropbox v0.93 BETA

MANW Contest Page

Vote & Support

[Rydygier 1309]

Decided, it's high time to play this. :)

Some feedback possible too. Just started, and already three things came to my mind, didn't read whole thread, not sure, if that was reported or not:

1. After calm beginning noise of motorboat hits you like a hammer. Unless it's intended, I would suggest increasing sound volume gradually, through few seconds. In general - making scene transitions a bit "softened", also as for black out - black in.

2. Probably known, but anyway - heads in the conversation camera not always fit the window well. For some animations you can even admire lack of any content of some heads or eyeballs from behind. In other cases heads disappear from the field of view or seems just slightly too low positioned.

3. When I got choice, if to work for them or refuse, I immediatelly saved the game to check both. Observations:

- I can move before choosing, not tested, how far, not sure, if intended;

- after first try (I was shot) loaded my save, determined to hide behind a house and then refuse, but from now on I can't choose anything anymore. Choosing any of these two actions does not result with anything, actions stays (so I have to start from the beginning apparently).

Suggestion: unless there is any "future" intended after refusal (don't know), there should be no chance to hide anywhere (like unable to move till too late), or perhaps no choice for user at all.

4. During entering Maxwell cutscene my character for some reason stopped to follow my "guide" in the half way, so second part of "touring" looked weird with me staying still, unable to move, and the guide walking away while talking (yelling?) to me through the shoulder.

5. Good idea with clearing the Stratis mission. Beginning is immersive, I feel motivated to continue, and at the moment it's not trivial to achieve that with me. :)

6. Music in game is good idea, but if played constantly, become tiring sooner or later. For now I'm hearing track after track, if that's all the time, at some point I'll just mute the music... This + constant chopper noise giving a bit annoying effect to me... (edit: but later seems better)

7.

There is apparently some kind of ambient traffic on Stratis. And I hear from time to time explosions, suspecting cars riding over the mines. It's intended? Such traffic wouldn't be too reasonable if roads are mined. LZ Connor mined too widely perhaps?

8. A question: is there any chance to find anything inside the buildings (eg when wandering through Stratis)? I'm lazy enough to ask. :)

9. After removing tactical glasses all GUI disappeared but not details of currently pointed target, that disappeared only, when I stopped to point at it. For some reason no 0-8 GUi available at the camp made impossible to see GUI again after wearing the glasses again.

Playthrough notes:

1. First thing, I did after checking the camp was riding south, through yellow-flagged areas towards the lighthouse. At LZ Connor I found nothing but mines. At the lighthouse I spotted several hostiles. Had only a pistol, so reasonable would be to withdraw. To hell with reason. Waited, until they start to walk around the road, then charged with my car to ram as many of them, as possible. Result: I wounded, car damaged, 4 hostiles dead. Not bad. Managed to ride on the other side of the slope to avoid further fire, and hid in the lighthouse. When two survivors came, I shot them using pistol. Gathered al the loot and returned back to the camp. Then I noted, so I was healed, but my car was not repaired. Amongst the loot I found tool kit, but apparently car wasn't damaged enough to make me able to fix it. Most stuff I sold, some stashed, rest took with me. Now I have 6.5mm/GL NATO rifle with ARCO, plenty of ammo, FAKs, medikit, tool kit, mine detector, mines, charges, vest, backpacks, spare Katiba nad 5.56 rifles + the ammo and grenades. And I'm wondering, if this will go that way further, would I even once be motivated to buy anything in the shop (> 17.000 euros to spent so far).

2. So now I hit the closest red flag. With current armament it wasn't hard. As expected, now collecting even more stuff, including AT launchers, will be much easier and in this pace I should soon become very wealthy merc. During looting the bodies started to wonder, should I continue clearing the Stratis task, which I would preffer, or maybe start some other mission before it become too easy due to lots of stuff and money and I become too blase due to same reason. During the firefight noted, so although useful for spoting, unit markers of the glasses' GUI, especially if unit is far and/or prone, are obscuring the enemy, what makes targetting difficult and situation - danger to me.

To make looting faster, I left weaponry and stuff in the trunk. Exactly then I was attacked. I don't herd them and was surprised, because I took off my headphones - noise of the chopper contantly trying it's engine near became to tiring (JSRS may cause the difference though). So, I had to load last save at this point. Good, I'm saing every two steps.Now I noticed, the hostile patrol, that engaged me, is moving towards helipad, so I waited to see, what will happen, if they reach merc base.

Although they went pretty close t the helipad, I heard no fighting, so decided to follow them. During that noted, so probably unit icons of tactical glasses are disappearing, when some object is blosking the LOS, but terrain looks transparent to my glasses, so icons was still visible trhough the ground. Didn't learned, what happened to the patrol, because went too close to the camp and was switched into camp mode, while enemies apparently disappeared.

Next try decided just to shoot them out. When I did, turned out, according to map markers, these guys was a garrison from another flagged location, that for some reason decided to move somewhere. Also noticed, so during the fight one tire of my demolished car was shoot off completely. Luckilly, this time car was damaged enough to let me fix it to the so-so state. So, when I was trecking between the bodies and car trunk (quite capacious thanks to Bigger Trunks addon), I thought, I must start some real merc job, before I realize, simple looting near thugs is in fact much easier and more profitable. Found also Mk18 with ammo and DMS optics. I wondered again, do I really need to buy anything in the shop or do I need for anything the money, I'll earn by selling all the loot? Amount of stuff, I collected for sure was enough to open my own gun shop...

...Thus, I decided to revert back and play without any looting on Stratis. :)

3. So, started again, only merc jobs this time. After a several I would say, it's really well done campaign. I enjoy it much more than, eg, official campaign. Very like merc themes designed such way. Looks well balanced despite, I invested in most capacious backpack and vest and returning from each mission overloaded like a camel. Nothing serious to report so far except serious enjoyment, one small thing - in the mission, where I'm tasked to be a driver for some businessman, I felt, like something bad should happen, but nothing such happened. There was one moment, where we passed a car destroyed by a mine, probably intended for us, and second time, when we're riding back, checkpoint was empty, there was some words, so it's an ambush and we should revert. I, following my instinct, did opposite and pushed forward towards airport... and that's all about it. Second problem was of design nature, during overwatching paying the ransom, pirate stared to fire at my collegues. So I fired at him. But he was immune to my bullets, apparently due to planned mission plot.

4. Disappearing things. Sometimes, eg today after resuming in the Maxwell, some things disappear. I had stored my favourite Mk18 in my vest, and it's simply gone now... I suspect game bug. So, good thing, I'm gathering enough money to buy lacking equipment again, still annoying. But not even in the half as annoying, as this damn chopper at base. I hoped, he'll be so noisy only at the beginning of the campaign, but apparently engine problems continue through whole game. I have to take off my headphones each time I'm in Maxwell. :) Also one of found Katiba rifles was evalueted 0, and I'm unable to sell it.

5. Liked a lot mission with destroying the base. I took missile launcher with AP missiles and 12.7 sniper rifle. I had a mortar, satchels and even armed UAV (not used, too shitty pilot). 0.50 used to clear the small outpost (practically from starting position, 1300 meters) and roadblock. When on position simply wasn't sure, which kind of mayhem should I bring on them. Used all except charges. Fun, fun, fun. They said, it's enough, but I had to destroy everything, so continued till end of shells and targets. :)

6. Mission Panzerfaust seems little bugged. Briefing officer was sunk to the knees into the ground... Attack itself was kinda rushy, contact was made, when I had still 100 meters from my covering position. It was wild and rapid, also ended shortly. Now no more missins to choose, and boss want to talk with me. Interesting. :)

7. So, I had a choice. Debt is paid - would I stay or go my way? Tried the latter first and explored both branches. Very nice ending, if someone want to exit campaign here. I do not. :) So reverted and said, I'll stay after all. I expected some kind of finale mission or something. What I nice surprice instead. :) Now, I must admit, for me it's great option in any game ability to make a difference by investing own resources into things like defenses etc. (I am/was great fan of games like "build own castle"). For me it's an essence of satisfactory gameplay - to make a global difference by local actions a watching the consequences. So I got that into my hands - now I can enforce new camp! Fantastic. I had already thanks to hard looting around 70.000, so at init was able to purchase majority of improvemets and left with 300 euros, just enough for some ice cream :) . One regret - so there isn't MORE (and then even MORE) stuff to buy. Not saw yet, how attack on the camp may look like, but some ideas: investing into training resulting with higher skills of the guards (several levels, each gives lesser gain for bigger cost raise), investing into guard's armament, maybe some more guards recruiting, including expensive well trained specialists like snipers and such, or some mortar... Maybe some more statics with ability to locate them manually (nothing fancy, just an action, "place it here", in the direction, I'm looking at). More ideas may appear, when I see the attack. Second nice surprise was the fact, we crashed the chopper. Finally! The silence!

8. Next mission - clear the crash site. Barely eliminated looters, AAF came. Luckilly, just before I found myself uder fire, managed to grab PCML and 3 missiles. I didn't waste even one. Yes, chopper, that joined the swamp party was so kind and after sweeping hovered still, so I was able to shot it down with AT missile. After that mission had enough money to buy all remaining camp enhancements. Next I chose mission with lasing the targets for CAS. Another interesting mission. At first, when I suddenly became a jet pilot, I thought, that's it, and I'll be not able to finish the mission - with jets I can do only one thing. Crash them. Luckilly, I found, so there is unit switch enabled, so I immediately switched back. Result was a bit misleading, because after sweet bombardment (not so sweet for FPS though) there was conversation, so I should go recon Pyrgos for some commander to kill, but then pilot was shot down and was ordered to reach my position. Wasn't sure, what to do, decided to wait for the pilot. But he wasn't moving... Then I understood, so this pilot has to be lead by a player or reached by me. That team switch feature made easier second this part of the mission - I could move both, my character and the pilot towards most convenient meeting spot. The easier, sdo, as discovered, 3D marks of my glasses was still active, when I switched to pilot unit.

9. As next I took recon research facility mission. One small issue: at the end we had to ride towards new extracion point through two waypoints (decided to be a driver). Thing is, firs waypoint was at the town, where according to Intel battle was under way. And we had a chopper on our tail. So I of course took wide detour to avoid the battle. But doing so I also omitted first waypoint, so when we arrived at second, there was nothing and nothing happened, as mission progress was bounded with waypoint not, eg, distance from target position. So I could do two things: ride back into the battle to "check out" first waypoint, or use this strange Arma feature to drag first waypoint on the map towards my location. I did the latter. Also two things as for the base: I bought an offroad to try it in the mission, but I couldn't choose that way of inserting. I could go at waypoint close to the car, but nothing happens. Wasn't too obvious to me, so I need to get in as passanger. Another thing: we could buy in the shop rifles with 3GL launchers, but sadly failed to find 3xGL magazines in the shop. Pity, would be nice to have such advantage of more rapid 40mm fire.

10. Three more missions, all different, all great (retrieve data from CSAT agent, sink the ship and it's captain, toy with the tanks to make an incident). Only one small issue: in the last of these we've stolen some tanks to make some nice party. Optional objective was to attack also Tanks Depot. After clearing the first line (there was message, it's done) we went there and clear that place too (all vehicles, all hostiles). But at the end there was no any message and optional objective wasn't checked out, like the attack on the depot never happened.

11. Finding paranoid IT specialist. Very cool idea. Unfortunatelly, I stuck permanently on that math equasion. I simply don't understood English math terminology (appeared to be also cryptology involved... simpy too much for my poor vocabulary and math understanding), while google translator is highly misleading on these. Main problem was, what "i" is, how to uderstand it in Polish. Anyway, after checking this I became 100% confident, I would never guess that meaning of "i" on my own, as apparently I completely misunderstood indice/index meaning in English (took it as an exponent like x^i) and would simply never bound it with coord number index, completely out of my ways of thinking. What I tried was simpy substituting E with 651269 and K with 678145, so I got Di = 651269i - 678145i mod 10, but i was still of unknown value, so formula was unsolveable according to such thinking due to lack of data. The more, IMO formula seemed to be according to linked solution wrongly noted, at least as for known to me math standards:

if

i = 0

D0 = 6 - 6 mod 10 = 0 mod 10 = 0

then should be: Di = (Ei - Ki) mod 10 not Di = Ei - Ki mod 10, because in the latter case we have:

i = 0

D0 = 6 - 6 mod 10 = 6 - 0 = 6

So even if I would grasp, how to undestand i (most unlikely), I would anyway fail because of formula notation understanding.

Anyway, he told me, he is observing my actions, so teoretically could be somewhere near, but then I though, such specialist equally well could observe me via satellite or something, so this means nothing. In the effected I resigned also from searching for him near my position (sounded too futile...).

BTW two more observations about stashed equipment. I left my usual rifle to try another on the mission. All attachements, I did not separate at leaving the rifle was gone. From the other hand, I brought from the mission two rifles, orignally with attachements (default attachements, I suppose, unlike those disappeared from my rifle). I took all those attachements off before extraction, but at the base rifles had attachement on them again, so seems, I effectively multiplied them x2.

12. After that I enlisted AAF. There was an issue on the shooting range. I wanted repeat shooting, so loaded last save. But after that some later conversation about FIA in the Sofia kicked in. So tried previous save, just after disembarking the truck. Same result... Now the following coversation suggested, we're riding APC while we was still standing at the truck near shooting range. Just weather changed. What's the more weird, I saw team memebrs icons, also 3D somehwere far, while I was just standing unable to move. Looks like mission breaker...

13. Next mission was about abducting the scientist. Found there nothing but good fun. Decided to intercept the car. There was three possible routes. That, I chosen as most probable was the right one.

14. After that - smell of the grand finale. Three offers. Which to choose if any? Of course planned to check every of them, but which should be my official? When thinking about that at third meeting spot (DSE) bodyguards suddenly started to shoot. Someone is attacking? No. they just bravely engaged my empty quadbike. Hmm. Return on foot then. Eventually decided to be consequent. I wanted to move to Europe and live there, so I'll. Those knights was anyway too surreal to take them seriously, but probably I have to stay with them to see base defense battle...

15. So we're attacking the facility. I've chosen support from the ridge role so i was doing exactly that. After a time all fightings calm down, yet no progress. i thought, classic "hidden survivor" issue. So I was forced to abandon my post and finish the job personally. Then there was info about searching for the device and loading it. We was tasked to defend the base till then, but nothing happened, just time passed. Then device was loaded, order was for infiltration team to get the truck out of there immediatelly. So I was waiting at the truck to see, if infiltration team will do the job. Apparently not. He was just standing near the gate just as me. So after probably it's my job... But as soon I entered the truc,k they called me a thief and ordered all to stop me. Not good. Had to load earlier save. By the way noted, for some reason not all my saves are on the list, I saved just before entering the truck, yet I had to load save from before final clearing the facility. Weird. So I repeated last part. This time supposed driver get in the truck properly and mission ended.

16. Finally the base defense. At first tried option to escape with Drazen. This failed because of his most weir behavior. At first he simply refused to leave the building. Tried make him embark the truck as a driver and pointng various places to go... Eventually/suddenly he left the house on his own. But as soon I gave him next move order he... got in back. Battle is raging on around, and we're dancing here... Nah. Restarted. Same problems. Third time ignored him.

Battle was fantastic. Lots of shooting, shouting, booming, dying, flying and lagging. I located my men on the slope of the central hill to have fire support from elevated position. Most of them died, survivors I relocated to the another, lower spot of the slope towards the camp. One chopper was shot down by our AA turret, but then apparently missiles was all used, so second chopper and fast movers had clear sky except static MGs. Despite foggy weather we in general repelled all the attacks. Then happend nothing. I assume, it's another "hidden survivor" problem. Some managed to find and kill myself, but then I had no more free time for extensive hunt around the camp and as affraid, I have to kill fast movers too, whilke these was flying somehwere far, barely audible. IMO there should be more flexible conditions of progress than simple "kill them all and every one" and definitelly attackers should just flee when most of them died. So, until I find them all later, looks, like it's kinda over of this fantastic campaign.

to be continued?

Edited November 17, 2014 by Rydygier

[IndeedPete 1038]

Glad to hear you're trying it! ;)

1. Since you wrote that you're using JSRS I suppose that's somewhat louder / more intense that A3's original boat sound. But even then, a smooth transition was not intended.^^

2. Yes, seems like a character's position does not change properly with some animations. Especially annoying if you put the player into performing an AI-Only animation, hence I had to use camscripts on a few occasions where first person was intended but not possible. At some point I'll have to find a better approach for positioning the camera in my conv script but that has obviously low priority compared to other tasks and bugs.

3. Yes, you can try to run away. Saving seems to cause some issues I might disable it. Not quite sure why, but there's a waituntil inside the mission flow waiting for your answer and that seems to fail / stuck when saving loading at that point. This "choice" is somewhat fake but I liked the idea, changed especially this opener like 100 times by now.^^

5. Thanks, though it is totally unpolished and initial at the moment (just to have something). It's repetetive and should get boring fast but it's progress is saved throughout the campaign and the rogues are not taking places back (yet). It's also messing with te balancing as you noticed somewhen later. As said, it's an initial solution that really needs some polishment.

6. That's where my lazyness striked, apart from special scenes music is being played by a jukebox function and sometimes feels out of place or gets annoying. Again, not perfect but inital, to have some background noise.

7.

Yes, there is ambient traffic. Mostly to give the player a possibility to acquire a new car when his breaks down. I also heard it one time. Let's call it a nasty side effect from greedy civilians raming the island. :D And every mine some else is stepping on is one less to worry about for you, just saying...

8. Not yet, because - as said - it's all pretty much inital. The whole capture Stratis mechanic was an afternoon of work or so, before that there were fixed loot points which I've deleted. But I haven't started work on a dynamic loot system or dynamic camp placement yet.

9. Yes, when deactivating the Glass System the detail box will show up one time again, might have forgotten to implement a proper check there to exit the loop before showing the box one last time. TacPad removal is a bit clunky at the moment. Originally you weren't supposed to have it available on the hubs at all. But then the Capture Stratis thing came and I though it would be stupid to not have the Glass System available hence it's a bit clunky now until I find a permanent solution.

1. Yes, adding the capture Stratis thing somewhat messed up the balancing, especially of the shop. I might make the Stratis mission available after at least finishing some of the story missions before. But I wanted to get some long term feedback like this before. I see to it to imporve the balance there. Also from a logical point of view it doesn't make sense. Raif is force to work there to get his debts paid but on the other hand he has like 50.000 in his bank account through intensive looting. oO The car is not being repaired that's true, but it's also not saved, there's a new car every time you return to the hub. Not sure if Raif is an engineer class there already or if it comes with the next update.

2. The Glass System is being influenced by objects in the way, though it seems lineIntersects is somewhat buggy because some markers stay persistent even if there's a hill in the way. Glass is not fully accurate (and it's not meant to be) but I find it's a huge advantage nontheless.

JSRS really is a noisy dude. I only have recently started to use it but I like it so far, even if I have to turn down the volume a bit.

For performance reasons everything insde the camp gets disabled / hidden so your own people won't help you and when returning to the hub every outside patrol will be despawned as well.

Thanks for the feedback, keep up!

---------- Post added at 03:08 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:05 PM ----------

Addition to your edit: Yes, as said implementing the Capture Stratis task messed with the overall balancing. I might lower the selling prices or adjust the gear of the rogues / pirates. Or make the mission not available until the player has done a few main jobs.

[Rydygier 1309]

I might lower the selling prices or adjust the gear of the rogues / pirates. Or make the mission not available until the player has done a few main jobs.

I have few ideas as for balancing this:

1. Indeed, lower prices, but not so huge outraging selling-buying difference, like in many other games. Also some stuff could be more expensive. BTW some prices are hard to justify. Eg why LRPS optics are twice as expensive as SOS? What's the difference between them? Not sure, if possible, but you could try to learn real world prices and adjust proportions. Unless you did that already... or it's done dynamically, via juggling with config values;

2. Much less locations to take (anyway looks a bit weird, so dense opfor population on the so small island), like 15-20% of current or so;

3. Arm opfors with really shitty equipment (not much better, than player's initial, IMO reasonable) and low ammo, no fancy stuff, or very rare, most really valuable things should be available only via shop or during main plot missions;

and/or optionally:

4. Along with "easy" flags, according to p. 3, also literally few heavily guarded areas (I suggest statics, mines, and top-notch skilled opfor) with better equipment, but even there in very moderate amounts. This way all may be available from the beginning, but to reach better equipment, you need to progress through main plot, not only loot some easy flags, so rather no chance to clear whole island before first mission.

keep up!

I'll! :) I would rather edit same post with new playthrough feedback, than adding new posts each time though.

2.

The Glass System is being influenced by objects in the way, though it seems lineIntersects is somewhat buggy because some markers stay persistent even if there's a hill in the way.

Just in case, you don't know, there are two commands for checking LOS, one for terrain only, one for objects only. So seems to me, something wrong with the part checking LOS for terrain. I used to TPW's tactical glasses earlier, and those AFAIK have no problems with reliable LOS checks, so should be doable. As for design, I would suggest to play a bit more with half-transparency.

Edited October 26, 2014 by Rydygier

[IndeedPete 1038]

Yeah, I will get down to balancing when the contest is over. I plan to publish the last update / MANW Release Candidate later this day which sorts out a few bugs and then nothing will happen until deadline. I'm a bit exhausted anyway, so work on this project will most likely be slower in the future.

Feel free to add it to the post and I'll try to keep up with reading it. ;)

I actually didn't know about the second LOS commad, I'll check it out, thanks!

[IndeedPete 1038]

So, hopefully last update before that MANW deadline!

Changelog

0.94 Beta - MANW RC - 26.10.2014

• FIXED: Minor chanegs and fixes.
  
• FIXED: BI's randomsation scripts' leftovers.
  
• FIXED: Riot Control, fleeing was still enabled for hostile units.
  
• FIXED: Payback, script error on init.
  
• FIXED: Case Of Defence, added an ugly teleport for the Buddy because of his pathfinding / stucking issues.
  
• FIXED: Good Bye Altis, Buddy was not invincible.
  
• FIXED: Panzerfaust, AAF officer was diving.
  
• FIXED: Sanctuary, Meet And Greet, Case Of Defence, transport / support heli was still full of parachutes.
  
• CHANGED: Very Important Pickup, player is now an engineer and can fix the car.
  
• CHANGED: Enforced Cooperation, Doctor is now being added to player's squad.
  
• CHANGED: Case Of Defence, due to AI waypoint issues (they get stuck...) the win ratio has been set up from 25% to 30% of the last wave.
  
• CHANGED: Shop System, lowered the selling price for every weapon, magazine, item or vehicle from 1/2 to 1/5 of the buying price.
  
• ADDED: Ransom Demand, two more vehicles.
  
• ADDED: Good Bye Altis, one more enemy fireteam.
  

Download

Addon Version

Dropbox v0.94 BETA - MANW RC

Steam Workshop v0.94 BETA - MANW RC

Campaign PBO Version

Dropbox v0.94 BETA - MANW RC

MANW Contest Page

Vote & Support

Please note that the first upload attempt to the steam workshop FAILED. I'm trying to sort this out and hope it doesn't affect playability.

Seems like now I'm getting these errors other contestants had as well right on the final MANW version, now isn't that great? Please excuse my small rant but seriously: F*** you, steam workshop!

[IndeedPete 1038]

3. So, started again, only merc jobs this time. After a several I would say, it's really well done campaign. I enjoy it much more than, eg, official campaign. Very like merc themes designed such way. Looks well balanced despite, I invested in most capacious backpack and vest and returning from each mission overloaded like a camel. Nothing serious to report so far except serious enjoyment, one small thing - in the mission, where I'm tasked to be a driver for some businessman, I felt, like something bad should happen, but nothing such happened. There was one moment, where we passed a car destroyed by a mine, probably intended for us, and second time, when we're riding back, checkpoint was empty, there was some words, so it's an ambush and we should revert. I, following my instinct, did opposite and pushed forward towards airport... and that's all about it. Second problem was of design nature, during overwatching paying the ransom, pirate stared to fire at my collegues. So I fired at him. But he was immune to my bullets, apparently due to planned mission plot.

4. Disappearing things. Sometimes, eg today after resuming in the Maxwell, some things disappear. I had stored my favourite Mk18 in my vest, and it's simply gone now... I suspect game bug. So, good thing, I'm gathering enough money to buy lacking equipment again, still annoying. But not even in the half as annoying, as this damn chopper at base. I hoped, he'll be so noisy only at the beginning of the campaign, but apparently engine problems continue through whole game. I have to take off my headphones each time I'm in Maxwell. :) Also one of found Katiba rifles was evalueted 0, and I'm unable to sell it.

3. Really glad you enjoy it so much, I hope it stays that way! The destroyed car is actually a coincidence. Driving on randomly mined roads is dangerous for the AI as well.^^ Yes, I pretend that the ambush was set up very quickly and unprepared by the enemy forces (they have to track your route and react in very short time after all). Breaking through is actually the best option, reverting / turning can be too slow and engaging the forces depends on the terrain, e.g. the chosen checkpoint. All three ways are working nontheless. It's your job to protect this guy and as mission designer I don't really care how. I just set up the trap and see how you perform. Since it's in a rather early stage of the campaign I didn't want it to be too hard, orginial plan was placing IEDs or blocking the road leaving no option but to fight.

Ransom Demand is what I call my weakest mission. It's not fully thought-out and artificially streched by regulations like the invincibility. I've never had the will to properly rework it and I decided to leave it in, just because one or two people enjoyed the car ride.

4. It is more or less a game bug. Problem are temporary full containers (clothes, vests, backpacks) when readding saved stuff to it. Finishing a mission or hub fully loaded will often cause a grenade or single mag to disappear, simply because there's one small moment between adding the magazines and weapons where this one mag that was actually loaded into the gun is too much to be added. Thus the addMagazine fails and that item disappears. Never heard of a weapon getting lost but I also didn't know it was possible to carry rifles in a vest. Probably related to the weapon mods though, their creators are sometimes using very low capacity values and you can carry around like five M-16s and two sniper rifles in one backpack. xX

I blame that chopper on JSRS! :D No, I will see to it to make the silent intervals longer or take it out most of the time. Also, they're completely silent at night...^^

Could you tell me the Katiba's name? Not sure which one it might be, could be I forgot to whitelist/map it into the shop system.

[Rydygier 1309]

Probably related to the weapon mods though, their creators are sometimes using very low capacity values

I know, but not the case. If you wear eg ELBV harness (most capacious, known to me) you can put in there even vanilla Mk18 (that one disappeared to me from the vest), if without attachements. :) Good, at least mechanism behind disappearings is known, this way I know, how to avoid.

Could you tell me the Katiba's name?

I'll when, I'll be back in the camp, but IIRC its plain long Katiba rifle, costs 0 according to shop. Maybe certain version as for attachements, but not sure, if I left them on it. Weird, because I think, I sold earlier same rifles...

[IndeedPete 1038]

It's just a guess. Commands used are vestItems / addItemsToVest. Wiki says they're also able of getting / adding weapons. Need to rewrite the functions anyway, I'm getting tired of these bugs, and more so of people reporting them.^^ But there are BIS functions for that stuff already, stumbled across them recently.

I've designed the shop completely whitelist-based so I have manual control of all items and stuff sold there. Even non-listed weapons are catalogued and usually have a reference to the basic model. But it's not unlikely I forgot to list a specific model. If the shop doesn't recognise an item it assigns a price of 0 and says the trader doesn't accept it.

[Rydygier 1309]

It is long Katiba with ARCO optics and IR Pointer (to me looks like "arifle_Katiba_ARCO_pointer_F" class). After last mission I had again full vest and full backpack for testing. From vest Rahim was gone, and one of the rifles from the backpack.

BTW - another item not possible to sell are simple binoculars.

Edited October 28, 2014 by Rydygier

[IndeedPete 1038]

Ah, the "arifle_Katiba_ARCO_pointer_F" wasn't listed in the shop, might have missed it. Will do some investigations on my own regarding the missing rifles. Especially have to try that vest thing.

Yeah, because Binoculars are sold as items but belong to CfgWeapons. The weapons or weaponCargo commands return the binoculars while the shop's item window relies on items / itemCargo which does not return binoculars. A bug in the shop but also a flaw in the game's configs I'd say. Backpacks are also in CfgWeapons but I can get them via backpackCargo. To get binoculars to show up correctly I'd need to implement a proper filter or direct check. Never seemed a priority to me, other things were more urgent / important.

Thanks for the details though!

[IndeedPete 1038]

5. Liked a lot mission with destroying the base. I took missile launcher with AP missiles and 12.7 sniper rifle. I had a mortar, satchels and even armed UAV (not used, too shitty pilot). 0.50 used to clear the small outpost (practically from starting position, 1300 meters) and roadblock. When on position simply wasn't sure, which kind of mayhem should I bring on them. Used all except charges. Fun, fun, fun. They said, it's enough, but I had to destroy everything, so continued till end of shells and targets. :)

6. Mission Panzerfaust seems little bugged. Briefing officer was sunk to the knees into the ground... Attack itself was kinda rushy, contact was made, when I had still 100 meters from my covering position. It was wild and rapid, also ended shortly. Now no more missins to choose, and boss want to talk with me. Interesting. :)

5. Glad you liked it, never thought to go in with a 50 cal but sounds like fun.^^

6. Yes, first problem is that the AI tanks are running over the infantry. Using tracking scripts show that AI units tend to ignore their waypoints and go really funny ways (already lsited under known issues). Contact message pops up when BLUFOR/INDFOR well, make contact, doesn't matter where the observation team is. Sometimes it ends really quick when the AAF doesn't mess up completely. If they decide to use their full incompetence it can take longer, might even get messy with the hostile tanks. Not sure how to optimise the AI movement, more waypoints maybe? Or completely scripted movement?

Oh and I thought I'd fixed that officer bug already. It occurs randomly and is the only animation set from BIS_fnc_ambientAnim I have problems with. Sometimes he's too high, sometimes in the ground, sometimes he's right on spot. Added a delay to set his animation post-init. Worked in testruns, doesn't seem to work for you. I found that restarting the mission helped but that's of course not what I'd consider a fix. Resetting his position when the anim function is already running doesn't work, seems like the function memorises a unit's position and constantly resets it. I've tried to avoid the anim set in future missions because of that hassle.

[IndeedPete 1038]

7. So, I had a choice. Debt is paid - would I stay or go my way? Tried the latter first and explored both branches. Very nice ending, if someone want to exit campaign here. I do not. :) So reverted and said, I'll stay after all. I expected some kind of finale mission or something. What I nice surprice instead. :) Now, I must admit, for me it's great option in any game ability to make a difference by investing own resources into things like defenses etc. (I am/was great fan of games like "build own castle"). For me it's an essence of satisfactory gameplay - to make a global difference by local actions a watching the consequences. So I got that into my hands - now I can enforce new camp! Fantastic. I had already thanks to hard looting around 70.000, so at init was able to purchase majority of improvemets and left with 300 euros, just enough for some ice cream :) . One regret - so there isn't MORE (and then even MORE) stuff to buy. Not saw yet, how attack on the camp may look like, but some ideas: investing into training resulting with higher skills of the guards (several levels, each gives lesser gain for bigger cost raise), investing into guard's armament, maybe some more guards recruiting, including expensive well trained specialists like snipers and such, or some mortar... Maybe some more statics with ability to locate them manually (nothing fancy, just an action, "place it here", in the direction, I'm looking at). More ideas may appear, when I see the attack. Second nice surprise was the fact, we crashed the chopper. Finally! The silence!

Yeah, could be a nice idea to have even more enhancements. I left it that way due to well, limited time and priorities... Need to make up proper hub sidemissions first to see how the financial balancing develops. Placeable statics might be a good idea. More player-led personnel is not really feasible as, when everything's built up and the free Knight's team is still alive, the player will directly command twelve guys in case of attack. More or less random attacks are planned as well but left out for time reasons (still to come though). Right now not every playstyle leads to a defence situation. Skill levels or specialists might be a possibility, though I already have skill levels implemented. Normal soldiers have usually around 3, mercs 4 and player-controlled AI or tough enemies level 5. Yeah, the chopper is gone but you've got background combat sounds now. Though they're not that noisy. :D

[Rydygier 1309]

Yes, but those sounds aren't even a bit that noisy nor annoying. In some way even on the contrary. :)

[IndeedPete 1038]

8. Next mission - clear the crash site. Barely eliminated looters, AAF came. Luckilly, just before I found myself uder fire, managed to grab PCML and 3 missiles. I didn't waste even one. Yes, chopper, that joined the swamp party was so kind and after sweeping hovered still, so I was able to shot it down with AT missile. After that mission had enough money to buy all remaining camp enhancements. Next I chose mission with lasing the targets for CAS. Another interesting mission. At first, when I suddenly became a jet pilot, I thought, that's it, and I'll be not able to finish the mission - with jets I can do only one thing. Crash them. Luckilly, I found, so there is unit switch enabled, so I immediately switched back. Result was a bit misleading, because after sweet bombardment (not so sweet for FPS though) there was conversation, so I should go recon Pyrgos for some commander to kill, but then pilot was shot down and was ordered to reach my position. Wasn't sure, what to do, decided to wait for the pilot. But he wasn't moving... Then I understood, so this pilot has to be lead by a player or reached by me. That team switch feature made easier second this part of the mission - I could move both, my character and the pilot towards most convenient meeting spot. The easier, sdo, as discovered, 3D marks of my glasses was still active, when I switched to pilot unit.

Right, that's why I left the flying optional and the mission handles a crashing pilot as well. There's actually an advanced hint talking about team switch but most players are probably a bit baffled when being ported into the pilot seat and miss it. When the pilot gets shot down and survives he actually gets a waypoint assigned so even when controlled by AI he should move towards the player's position. But then AI strikes and gets stuck... - it's actually faster to get him killed because him surviving isn't necessary, while Raif's death results in mission failure. The big ass explosion is pretty heavy in calculation, more so when using effect enhancing addons I suppose. I've decided to enhance the otherwise pretty weak GBUs by spawning five or six bombs more on impact and when hitting one of the vehicles at the base a chain reaction is triggered. Same happens in "An Eye For An Eye", just with less vehicles. Especially destroying the (optional) convoy is pretty hard without laser guidance and I found my system to keep laser targets "alive" is a bit buggy sometimes. Seems I forgot to put in a check for the Glass System to disable on teamswitch, thanks for the heads-up!

[Rydygier 1309]

Yeah, pilot was just standing there, I could see him trough my scope from overview position. It's better IMO, as otherwise he nearly for sure would be killed en route. It was quite nice concept/task to have two switchable units, enemies inbetween and the goal - to bring them together. I like it. Could be more dense, if AAF notice, he ejected and put together some chase. But maybe too difficult.

Especially destroying the (optional) convoy is pretty hard without laser guidance and I found my system to keep laser targets "alive" is a bit buggy sometimes.

I assumed, it's not longer an option after plane shot down and some buzzards flying around. So even didn't tried to find, where this convoy is and to where is heading...

[IndeedPete 1038]

The convoy is static for the sake of laser targeting (as it just arrived in Pyrgos) but the task gets canceled once the pilot is being shot down. Still feasible though considering that the second plane is invincible and also reacts to laser targets. Problem is that it's usually busy fighting the Buzzards. Tricky scenario and many variables to take into account. Shit can go sideways pretty quick and the mission needs to handle that. While I don't know where the pilot is going down as it's obviously related to where he's being shot down I could of course spawn a QRF somewhere going after the position of the wreck. But then again you just bombed the AAF's HQ and they're pretty much paralysed for the moment. I find it interesting though that the random patrols go automatically into combat mode when they spot the planes. Had it a few times that I was playing Raif and wanted to change my position, then noticed patrols in combat mode zeroing in on my position from all sides. Nasty bastards, wiped a few times but finally managed to go around them. Good to take some AI as protection with you as Raif is nowhere near invincible when playing the pilot. Another element that can get frustrating pretty fast.

[IndeedPete 1038]

9. As next I took recon research facility mission. One small issue: at the end we had to ride towards new extracion point through two waypoints (decided to be a driver). Thing is, firs waypoint was at the town, where according to Intel battle was under way. And we had a chopper on our tail. So I of course took wide detour to avoid the battle. But doing so I also omitted first waypoint, so when we arrived at second, there was nothing and nothing happened, as mission progress was bounded with waypoint not, eg, distance from target position. So I could do two things: ride back into the battle to "check out" first waypoint, or use this strange Arma feature to drag first waypoint on the map towards my location. I did the latter. Also two things as for the base: I bought an offroad to try it in the mission, but I couldn't choose that way of inserting. I could go at waypoint close to the car, but nothing happens. Wasn't too obvious to me, so I need to get in as passanger. Another thing: we could buy in the shop rifles with 3GL launchers, but sadly failed to find 3xGL magazines in the shop. Pity, would be nice to have such advantage of more rapid 40mm fire.

10. Three more missions, all different, all great (retrieve data from CSAT agent, sink the ship and it's captain, toy with the tanks to make an incident). Only one small issue: in the last of these we've stolen some tanks to make some nice party. Optional objective was to attack also Tanks Depot. After clearing the first line (there was message, it's done) we went there and clear that place too (alll vehicles, all hostiles). But at the end there was no any message and optional objective wasn't checked out, like the attack on the depot never happened.

9. The waypoint is actually set a bit away from the village. There is no need to go around it completely, it's actually possible to break right through the frontline, the AI is usually too slow / busy to react. Didn't even know about this "feature". ;)

Yes, at the moment you have to board passenger side. Once the sidemission generator is done ground vehicles will be unlocked so players can use them to roam the area and do sidejobs.

Sounds like a few classnames I've missed again. I think I've never used the 3GL and never saw a unit heaving ammo for that. Will include that in the next update.

10. Not sure what's going on with the seized by trigger there. Changed it like two times by now but users still report problems, will have to investigate further. For now, you can extract after the first objective already. The second one is like in Badass One more for people who enjoy flying / driving and wish to cause some extra damage. ;)

[IndeedPete 1038]

Hi there!

The voting deadline for the MANW contest just passed around one hour ago and I'd like to throw out a huge "Thank You" to all 91 Voters and 135 Supporters! Thanks to all the great people here on the forums, on steam, facebook and twitter who played and tested M.E.R.C.S., provided feedback or helped me with technical problems, or supported me in the creation of ingame assets! Thank you, I'd take my hat off if I had one! *plop*

Now go, open a bottle and find yourself a slutty dressed Halloween boy/girl for the night! :p I'll drink to you people!

Oh, and if anyone's interested in future work, the development on M.E.R.C.S. is not completed and I will continue fixing bugs and enriching the existing content. However, I've also commenced work on a joint operation with Surfer. I don't want to reveal too much, so I'll just leave you with some quickly taken development shots:

Enjoy! :)

[IndeedPete 1038]

11. Finding paranoid IT specialist. Very cool idea. Unfortunatelly, I stuck permanently on that math equasion. I simply don't understood English math terminology (appeared to be also cryptology involved... simpy too much for my poor vocabulary and math understanding), while google translator is highly misleading on these. Main problem was, what "i" is, how to uderstand it in Polish. Anyway, after checking this I became 100% confident, I would never guess that meaning of "i" on my own, as apparently I completely misunderstood indice/index meaning in English (took it as an exponent like x^i) and would simply never bound it with coord number index, completely out of my ways of thinking. What I tried was simpy substituting E with 651269 and K with 678145, so I got Di = 651269i - 678145i mod 10, but i was still of unknown value, so formula was unsolveable according to such thinking due to lack of data. The more, IMO formula seemed to be according to linked solution wrongly noted, at least as for known to me math standards:

if

i = 0

D0 = 6 - 6 mod 10 = 0 mod 10 = 0

then should be: Di = (Ei - Ki) mod 10 not Di = Ei - Ki mod 10, because in the latter case we have:

i = 0

D0 = 6 - 6 mod 10 = 6 - 0 = 6

So even if I would grasp, how to undestand i (most unlikely), I would anyway fail because of formula notation understanding.

Anyway, he told me, he is observing my actions, so teoretically could be somewhere near, but then I though, such specialist equally well could observe me via satellite or something, so this means nothing. In the effected I resigned also from searching for him near my position (sounded too futile...).

BTW two more observations about stashed equipment. I left my usual rifle to try another on the mission. All attachements, I did not separate at leaving the rifle was gone. From the other hand, I brought from the mission two rifles, orignally with attachements (default attachements, I suppose, unlike those disappeared from my rifle). I took all those attachements off before extraction, but at the base rifles had attachement on them again, so seems, I effectively multiplied them x2.

11. Ah, I see. Seems like many people have problems interpreting the i as index. From a programmer's perspective the encrypted number and key could be shown as arrays. E = [6,5,1,2,6,9] and D = [6,7,8,1,4,5]. While the formula just says map the Ith element from E on the Ith element from D. As for the order of the operations it seems like there are different implementations, many even allowing negative results which shouldn't be possible in GF(10) (AFAIK, not a mathematician myself). The calculations I did in the past few years on paper didn't require extra brackets (though they could be useful, I agree). The Arma engine as well as Windows 8.1's calculator allow negative numbers as result, some other programms I've tried gave out positive results only. Unfortunaley, Arma's structured text doesn't allow proper formular notation hence I had to do it clunky with the Ei, Di etc. Nontheless, below is the calculation of coordinates:

Di = Ei - Ki mod 10

E = 651269

K = 678145

i = 0

D0 = 6 - 6 mod 10 = 0 mod 10 = 0

i = 1

D1 = 5 - 7 mod 10 = -2 mod 10 = 8

i = 2

D2 = 1 - 8 mod 10 = -7 mod 10 = 3

i = 3

D3 = 2 - 1 mod 10 = 1 mod 10 = 1

i = 4

D4 = 6 - 4 mod 10 = 2 mod 10 = 2

i = 5

D5 = 9 - 5 mod 10 = 4 mod 10 = 4

New set of grid coords: 083124 <--- This is where you have to go. ;)

And yes, he is actually in the AO and it's possible to find him without doing the riddle. You've passed him on insertion. ;) The cryptographic method used is called One-Time-Pad, based on the more theoretical Vernam cipher. Only method considered fully safe (well, as safe as it can get) as it uses keys of the same size the encrypted data has (for every data bit there's a key bit). Means the key sizes are actually too big to handle in day to day business, hence it's more theoretical to my knowledge.

Yes, the duplication bug originates in the fact that weapons are only saved as classnames and there is no way to retrieve the attachements of a weapon inside a container (box , backpack). Hence if you disassemble them attachements duplicate. Not sure yet how to counter this issue.

[Rydygier 1309]

Yes, the duplication bug originates in the fact that weapons are only saved as classnames and there is no way to retrieve the attachements of a weapon inside a container (box , backpack). Hence if you disassemble them attachements duplicate. Not sure yet how to counter this issue.

Hm. Could be not worthy of efforts, as this is tertiary issue, and not sure, if good idea at all, too late to think clearly, but you could try to utilize InventoryOpen/closed event handlers. At EH open save state of player's weaponry including attachements (primaryWeaponItems etc (for weaponry in use), weaponsItemsCargo (for weapons stored in the vest/backpack, if this will work in such case)...) then do same at closing the inventory and compare, what changed as for weapons and attachements in player's posession and as for box content (or just compare, what player had at opening, and what appeared in the box at closing). If you detect, so player is lacking certain weapon while same weapon appeared in the box, you could also determine, what attachements was put into the box attached to that weapon. Even if, as I would guess, at box content restoration it is impossible to attach an item to the weapon stored in the box, having such data should allow to place in the box same weapon in version without any atachements and saved attachements separately. Weak spots possible however, if between opening and closing the box player will eg store one rifle in the box and just then pick up same kind of rifle from the ground or when have two weapons of same type, but with different attachemets and store in the box one of them, while second leave on the ground - then you can't know, which was put where.

Or maybe use "Put" EH and at putting weapon into the box event remove all attachements from the weapon, and instead store all of them separatelly in the box. Then, at content restoration use same weapon class but in version without default atachements.

hence it's more theoretical to my knowledge.

Whole case has educational value. I have no any IT knowledge, the more never studied these matters, and most of the math except most basic stuff managed to forget long time ago, so googled a little and found wiki article, where was said, this kind of encryptions is used for the phone hot line between presidents of USA and Russia.

Edited November 1, 2014 by Rydygier

[IndeedPete 1038]

True, but IMO too much work for too little gain. Plus there's too many weak spots. The refill of the crate is solely classname-based, no way to add attachements. And for many combinations (especially with mod gear) there simply are no uniqe classnames. It just shows a flaw in BI's attachemend system. Weapons are not represented as objects, just as classnames / strings, everything is unit-centered. You can only get attached stuff when the player is wielding the weapon right now - or classname based from CfgWeapons. Still wondering how the engine handles customised weapons in containers, haven't found any commands yet. It seems like BIS tried to put this new attachement system right on top of the older fixed classname approach used in the previous titles.

Yes, in some really high class encryption scenario you might even use One-Time-Pads. Control of atomic warheads / ractors or hot lines between president's like you wrote yourself could be good examples. But our daily life requires much faster and slimmer methods to handle encryption. (Imagine you want to encrypt your 1TB HDD and need a 1TB long key...) As far as I know, in most cases web-based communication / encryption of data is based on symmetric (faster / less-secure) encryption standards like AES or DES while the key exchange process itself is handled with asymmetric methods like most famous RSA. Even our EC cards rely on standards from the 70's. :D Actually quite funny that my password on these forums is (in theory) harder to bruteforce than my EC PIN.

[kashwashwa 10]

In the mission "very important pickup" when I am driving toward the second research station, it seems like there's a scripted tire blowout, but when that happens, my truck explodes and I instantly lose the mission.

[IndeedPete 1038]

Hey, there are no scripted blow-ups, you might just hit a random mine. If you look closely you can actually see them as small black dots on the road.^^