Graphic Lag on newly created mission

[Jason Alaska 0]

I'm in the process of creating a capture & hold mission with 9 towns as the objectives. Each town has a flag and appropriate triggers.

-The mission worked fine-

I added sound triggers. As enemy presence was detected alarms went off in bases and dogs barked in towns.

-Worked fine-

I added Resistance fighters to defend each town. About 7 troops each on there own, not in a group, one group on patrol (8 Guys each group), and four waypoints assigned to them. I had an error "Only 63 groups per side is allowed." I cut back the numerber of troops in each town and left the Groups on patrol and that seemed to fix it.

-Here's where the real problem crept in.

I playtest the mission and get lag or graphic chop every 5 seconds. It might last for 1 to 2 seconds, play for a few and back to the lag/chop. I've restarted my system but it didn't change anything.

Any ideas? I've really got a great start on my mission, great concept, capture and hold played across a whole island... But DOUGH!

Thanks for any and all help provided. I'm on OFP 1.3 with a clean install from 1.20 to 1.30. System specs follow.

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

P4 1.7 Ghz

512 megs RDRAM

ASUS P4 Motherboard

ASUS Geforce3 64meg

Nvidia TNT2 32meg (Multi-monitor setup)

SoundBlaster Live! MP3 5.1

Network card

Adaptec SCSI card

Jaz drive

Zip drive

Pioner DVD-Rom (30x)

CD-Burner (8x)

(MS) Game Voice

(MS) Strategic Commander

(MS) Optical Mouse

Thrustmaster TQS, FLCS, RCS and digital chips installed

DX 8.1

Windows ME

[PlaneShifter 0]

Heh, that's almost the exact same type of mission I've been coming up with, resistance units and all ^_^

I threw in a bajillion units of every type on both sides as a test, no waypoints, but no significant slowdown (and I have a much slower system than yours) as long as all the units weren't in view at once, so it might be the AI calculations bogging things down, since you actually have units moving on your map.

Try cutting back the resistance further, or maybe put in some light-weight vehicles to increase their strength and reduce actual soldier numbers.

What I might do is let the player "purchase" resistance and other units at each town, using points (you earn a number of points per town per 15 seconds or so), so that all those units aren't moving around at the very beginning (they still have to exist at the beginning, but you can keep them separate from the main island and move them into position when purchased), and the player will probably only be able to put up defenses at 3 towns at a time, max, plus command a full squad of 12 to distribute between following you and defending towns as necessary.

Plus I was thinking it'd be cool to have to purchase vehicles as well, aside from some starting trucks and jeeps. You'll only have one heli of each type per side, and they'll be expensive. And definitely put in vehicle respawn.

- PlaneShifter -

[PlaneShifter 0]

Some other ideas I have for this type of mission:

*  Solid marker circles on the map: white = unoccupied, red = russian occupied, green = us occupied.  Makes it easy to track who has which towns.

*  At each town flag, if the player occupies that town, he can select to move the respawn point to that particular town (if the town gets taken by enemy forces, it'll move back to that side's "home base").

* The timeskip script you read about, which will add more strategy options! ^_^

* I want to figure out how to add a script so that you respawn with your starting payload, based on soldier type:  ordering AI soldiers to rearm is a pain in the ass!

* Every named town can be held, but some are worth more points than others--smaller ones cannot be reinforced with AI units, and units cannot be purchased at them, either.  2 or 3 of the larger towns will have higher point values.  Point value differences will be represented by the size of the color marker on the map.

* Each team's capitol is at the northern / southernmost cities on the island (I'm doing my testing so far on Malden)

* The island where the units sit until purchased, will, of course, be surrounded with a killzone.

- PlaneShifter -

(Edited by PlaneShifter at 3:56 am on Nov. 27, 2001)

(Edited by PlaneShifter at 3:58 am on Nov. 27, 2001)

(Edited by PlaneShifter at 4:01 am on Nov. 27, 2001)

[Jason Alaska 0]

Mine is an East VS West with resistance friendly to no-one, Capture and hold. But I've been watching the forums about ideas similar to yours. VERY ambitious! :-) But do try. I'd love to help any way I can. I've got the core part of the mission in place. I just need to figure out this lag/bug.

I think it's within the way the AI is handling clock cycles and that's why it's at a standard intervil. So maybe fewer waypoints, more groups of troops and fewer individual troops, ect. I think groups share AI so that would be fewer AI checks as a result. I'll try it and let you know.

I also wonder about the sound triggers. Each town and both starting bases have sound triggers assigned to them. I skewed some of the trigger shapes to cover the towns. All-in-all I have 20 sound triggers across the whole map. With another 18 flag triggers, one trigger per side (2x) 9 town objectives (9x) making another 18 triggers there. Is there a limit to the number of triggers?

I could send you what I've got if you're interested it's on Mulden with nine towns as objectives. Raising your flag in town captures it. Again let me know if I can help.

(Edited by Jason Alaska at 4:14 pm on Nov. 26, 2001)

[PlaneShifter 0]

Yes, I'd like a copy of your mission, please. My e-mail link should be visible above the post.

- PlaneShifter -

[Jason Alaska 0]

This map is what I wanted the timeskip feature for.

Things still to do on my map.

1.) The Markers on the map telling you who has what objective still need to be implemented.

2.) Island is seperated North to South, 3 sets of 3 towns, the 3 closest to each team base are worth less then the 3 in the middle. Also more heavily defended.

3.) Respawn points move to the town closest the front lines.

4.) AI. Add AI to play against. I have the Resistance But I want to be able to play against an AI team with triggers to activate which town to attack, like in the Official OFP CnH map "Sector Control", so they move to the towns they need to. Bypassing the ones they already have.

5.) Fix this BUG! ;-)

It's interesting how simaler our maps sound. I'm useing the Airfield in the N.E. corner of Mulden for the West team starting spot, The town and port of La Porta in the South East for East's starting spot.

I've toyed with the idea of making a capturable objective in the base of the enemy. Holding it only removes points from the score of the owner of the base. For example, if East takes West's base then West loses a couple points every few minutes untill they take it back. Making a come from behind victory possable.

Needless to say I like the way you think PlaneShifter! I'll work the map some tonight and send it at you.

[PlaneShifter 0]

I like your ideas (like holding the enemy's base taking away their points).

Oh, another idea I had was, a player must hold a town for a certain amount of time before they actually control it--so a player can't just do a mad dash for territory. You have resistance holding the towns on your map, though, which would remove the need for that.

And I can't wait to see the map!

- PlaneShifter -

[Jason Alaska 0]

I don't know how to includ the "Island Conquest.PBO". But I THINK it may be working now.

How I MAY have fixed it.

1.) Assign every squad leader a group name using the init field: SQUADNAME = group this command. (Thanks Sui for that one, by itself did not fix it though)

2.) removed all RADIUS statements in initial unit placement and from all waypoints.

3.) Removed a vehicle from inside a hanger that didn't show up in game anyway.

4.) Removed several individual troops not assigned to a group.

5.) Removed ALL wayponts causing troops to go into buildings.

Would anybody mind taking a look at this to see if it lags on there system. It doesn't lag on mine anymore but who knows! I'd like to know from users of a few differnt systems. The map has a LONG way to go this is at best an early BETA but any feedback would be great.

I'm interested in feedback on triggers in town when Resistance sees West or East, dogs start to bark. Can you tell me if there set up right to stop barking after East West is gone, or after Resistance is destroyed so they can no longer see them.

Are the flags working properly in towns?

---STILL TO COME FOR THIS MISSION---

1. More units for player use (ie more then one per side)

2. Respawning vehicles

3. Vehicles for the East forces

4. Markers over the town objectives (Just like the Official OFP Capture and Hold map "Sector Control"

5. Ammo Crates

6. Respawn points that relocate to the frontlines as towns are captured.

7. More resistance fighters.

8. AI controled East or West forces with dynamic objectives based on villages already captured.

9. Mission briefing.

10. Finalize the scoreing system.

11. More?

Thanks for any and all help and especialy the continued help!!!