[sp_camp] Dark Tides

[EO 11225]

Loving the campaign so far, production values are insanely good, cut-scenes are seamless, just heard one of my favourite rock tracks, awesome little easter eggs are to be found if your willing to investigate.....walking down a corridor I heard a toilet getting flushed, well didn't expect this. 

Looking forward to seeing this story unfold....

 

[EO 11225]

Hey there, are we good to post any arma anomalies we find along the way, no spoilers in regards to story, just general arma quirks that maybe haven't played out the way you planned?   

[AZCoder 921]

52 minutes ago, EO said:

Hey there, are we good to post any arma anomalies we find along the way, no spoilers in regards to story, just general arma quirks that maybe haven't played out the way you planned?   

 

Yeah, I expect there to be some. Every time I run through, or my playtester ran through it, weird this or that would show up. Depending on what it is, you might use spoiler tags. Thanks.

[EO 11225]

All good ^^

Spoiler

 

So on my way to the beach party....

Spoiler

I pretty certain this jet was supposed to take off for some flyby ambience.....anyway no biggie, and it didn't stop me having a good time when I got there...

 

 

[AZCoder 921]

1 hour ago, EO said:

All good ^^

  Reveal hidden contents

 

So on my way to the beach party....

  Reveal hidden contents

I pretty certain this jet was supposed to take off for some flyby ambience.....anyway no biggie, and it didn't stop me having a good time when I got there...

 

 

 

Actually I knew about that one. It flies around Altis a couple times, sometimes it will buzz the beach, then it crashes on landing. I never expected anyone to see it....

BTW I left most aircraft unlocked on purpose. I figured if you want to fly around, the bay looks nice in the daylight, why not. In fact just as I cleared the runway, that jet crashed right behind me. Close call.

 

[corporal_lib[br] 396]

On 3/28/2021 at 1:15 PM, AZCoder said:

 

I moved all links to my personal website because this forum kept blocking my updates due to using external links (see first posting for link to my website). There I have all of the mods linked up, such as Max Women. Also, just curious, do Women at Work come from a land down under?

They used to... where people wonder "how can we sleep when our beds are burnin´" lol (this is the reboot of that aussie band, now with only baldy gals)

 

Hey, AZ, I´m having this nuissance: the music takes all other sound from the mission, except if there´s a cutscene... it happened on the mission at tanoa (Temple of Doom) and the beggining of the following mission (but the cutscene of the littlebird transporting Knight fella to the northern beach, the sound came back)

And the fireworks made my PC slow down to sluggish 3 fps... you´ve mentioned a girl hitting on knight...was it on this party or another one? had to interrupt the fireworks due to extreme lag so...

BTW, I almost lost the peep sex scene at Denmark´s flashback... noooice lol

 

Cyberpunk 2077 patch pulled me back yesterday, but tonight I´ll keep on dark tiding 😃

 

Cheers! 

[AZCoder 921]

12 hours ago, corporal_lib[br] said:

Hey, AZ, I´m having this nuissance: the music takes all other sound from the mission, except if there´s a cutscene... it happened on the mission at tanoa (Temple of Doom) and the beggining of the following mission (but the cutscene of the littlebird transporting Knight fella to the northern beach, the sound came back)

Are you running Blastcore? That's the one thing that kills FPS in some missions. The fireworks is one of those, and the big battle missions later on (Miroslavl', Moschnyi, and Livonia). Let me know.

 

Regarding sound, do you mean sound goes away entirely? I run the game with 100% voice/effect volume and 80% music in the game sound settings. Had a problem with music being too loud in places, and I lowered the volume on those. Try lowering the music in game settings and see if that helps, 

 

The flirt thing is just a very very minor easter egg at the bar.

 

 

[corporal_lib[br] 396]

14 hours ago, AZCoder said:

Are you running Blastcore? That's the one thing that kills FPS in some missions. The fireworks is one of those, and the big battle missions later on (Miroslavl', Moschnyi, and Livonia). Let me know.

 

Regarding sound, do you mean sound goes away entirely? I run the game with 100% voice/effect volume and 80% music in the game sound settings. Had a problem with music being too loud in places, and I lowered the volume on those. Try lowering the music in game settings and see if that helps, 

 

The flirt thing is just a very very minor easter egg at the bar.

 

 

Nope, I´m using (and maybe it could be the culpit) 

Maybe Taro8 is using functions and/or codeing similar to Blastcore =P

Effects sounds are gone (music and UI sounds remains)... shots, steps, explosions and conversations are gone, I´ve tried 100% volume, I´ve tried toggling audio channels (48/96/112/128) and nada
But if there´s a cutscene or outro the sounds are back...and I think it has happend on the other campaigns (Gambit Royale and Shadow Fall): the mission starts and it´s pitch back... I have to login on MCC and use the Virtual Arsenal to return to " normal" vision... I´ve tried this workaround to regain the sounds back, but no joy, only a cutscene brings back the effects sounds 🤔 

 

EUREKA! After some experiments and a hunch, I´ve nailed the culpit! I was using your other campaigns ArmA Laucher presets, so it would ALSO loads Gambit Royale and ShadowFall... once I´ve disabled both, it was all fine =P

 

I haven´t updated both, - ShadowFall is the 01/01/2020 version, Gambit is V3 (03/12/2019)

Tomorrow I´ll update both and try again (lost almost 2 hours making tests) - but loading JUST Dark Tides seems to workaround 😃

 

Cheers

[AZCoder 921]

@corporal_lib[br]  The Murr edition of Blastcore uses the Taro refractions, if I remember correctly, looks great but I get down to 3 FPS. Using an older Blastcore I don't have the problem (and no refractions).

 

Also I never imagined anyone would load the other campaigns at the same time. They are incompatible, older libraries. I've been working to bring them up to Dark Tides standards. I might even merge all 3 into one release, as long as it doesn't blow up my computer.

 

 

Seems that the Refractions are not the problem. I tested it, never got below 25 FPS on the fireworks.

[corporal_lib[br] 396]

14 hours ago, AZCoder said:

@corporal_lib[br]  The Murr edition of Blastcore uses the Taro refractions, if I remember correctly, looks great but I get down to 3 FPS. Using an older Blastcore I don't have the problem (and no refractions).

 

Also I never imagined anyone would load the other campaigns at the same time. They are incompatible, older libraries. I've been working to bring them up to Dark Tides standards. I might even merge all 3 into one release, as long as it doesn't blow up my computer.

 

 

Seems that the Refractions are not the problem. I tested it, never got below 25 FPS on the fireworks.

I´ll reload the Beach Party and test it again... maybe the older campaigns could be the culpit of the slugish fps at the fireworks
Anyways, the lack of sound was annoting but it is fixed lol everything else I can deal with 😃
Loved the dialog about the guy with the jetski at Miroslav (We have already crossed the Rubicon - I love this quote whenever it is used =D

 

Cheers

[EO 11225]

Checking in to say I'll be picking up the story over the weekend, I've just arrived in Tanoa....

Regarding sound, my audio settings are similar to AZC's and I haven't encountered any sound related issues so far, effects at 100% music at 70%  

I also have fps to spare (new pc) so Blastcore Murr edition sounds like a challenge I can't refuse.      

[AZCoder 921]

1 hour ago, EO said:

Checking in to say I'll be picking up the story over the weekend, I've just arrived in Tanoa....

Regarding sound, my audio settings are similar to AZC's and I haven't encountered any sound related issues so far, effects at 100% music at 70%  

I also have fps to spare (new pc) so Blastcore Murr edition sounds like a challenge I can't refuse.      

The guy working on Murr is pretty cool, he fixed the campfires so they are no longer infernos, great looking blast waves too. Sometimes when I run it the FPS is still 20+ but I have trouble aiming, my dude is slow to respond, kind of jerky. These things happen in the middle of the campaign, Moschyni through Livonia (the big battles). And sometimes the FPS will bottom out.

[Hans(z) 56]

As far as I played this is top tier content!!!

One bug: Operator is equipped with AAF UAV terminal - you cannot open terminal and connect it to darter.

[AZCoder 921]

52 minutes ago, Hans(z) said:

As far as I played this is top tier content!!!

One bug: Operator is equipped with AAF UAV terminal - you cannot open terminal and connect it to darter.

 

That was fixed and pushed to Steam yesterday (99% certain) :)    Funny thing is I forgot that I had a UAV in there most of the time and only tested it on Pecher where in fact I did have the right UAV LOL.

And thanks for the comments!

[AZCoder 921]

I pushed another update. Mainly it was a total refactoring of how I handled scripting in the 6th mission New Management. I've had several reports of crashes in one area of the map. I cannot recreate it and my test player had no crashes, so I did the next best thing and cleaned up the scripting the best I can.

 

Also, it may be too early to ask this, but is there any interest in seeing a Gates of ARMAgeddon Complete Edition? I could merge all 3 campaigns into one. Of course it might melt a few PCs. At any rate, I am working on updates to Gambit Royale first which will take a few more weeks, and then Shadow Fall which will see the most changes.

[spotter001 82]

Seems i’m out of luck. After the first cut scene i get the black screen. Can hear the footsteps when moving. I even see the world after saving and loading but no tasks are created and NPCs are static. Pretty sure I have all the mods, I would get some error otherwise. 

[AZCoder 921]

You have the bug fix update from a couple hours earlier?

Also if you have Shadow Fall loaded, unload it.

I can't look at it again for several days.

 

[spotter001 82]

Yay! It works! I resubscribed to the campaign, seems the patch fixed it. Thanks for suggesting!

[Flanky 6]

Hi @AZCoder

 

Thank you for this marvelous campaign! It was a lot of fun to play and the immersion details were really really felt. It made the difference!

I wish we had more campaign creators just like you.

 

As per my comment on Steam page for your campaign here is my feedback.

There were some small problematic tidbits - I am not sure if it was my setup or these are genuine bugs but i noticed:

• Knight's Binocular Rangefinder does not have a night vision capability rendering it useless in night missions. So maybe vanilla rangefinder would do.
• in the Ultimatum mission i noticed Royal was missing Medikit in his backpack.
• Temple of Doom:

 

Helicopter was following me even in total dark and despite me not attacking it, i was immediately agro-ed when i reached port.

• Bishop had AAF UAV controller (instead of NATO one) in missions: Agent Extract, Dead weight and Pravda - I saw this bug was already reported but even after the claimed update i played the campaign just yesterday and problem was still present.
• K-9 problem in the mission Dead Weight - If you order doggy into the heli, the heli will refuse to land. It would probably be good to put some hint to player not to worry about the dog. That doggy will mount the chopper automatically once your team is all in.
• Ultimatum mission:

 

When i was in the building that was next to Denmark's location (i guess it was a school - enter-able building with interiors). I triggered the dialog about Denmark asking Americans to leave but somehow i did not (at first) triggered the option to leave the mission. I had to restart the mission because i did not wanted to kill Denmark. The  second time i approached the building from east and this time it was ok.

So maybe there are 2 triggers and each one having a slightly different area size or shape?

• Independence day celebration on the beach: That fireworks effect totally killed my GTX 980. I had to in a very quick succession radio to start the fireworks and another radio to finish it before it even started or i was in deep trouble. Maybe an option to skip this with a video prerecorded of the effect for those of us who do not own RTX 3080 cards? :)

 

Some small ideas for little improvement:

• In the Pravda mission it was a real bummer when i could not see the chemical detector with NVG goggles on. Yes i know this is an issue with core game. Maybe some audible sound could do? Also

 

Artyom could use some choking sounds or breathing sounds that could be triggered when player is nearby

• In the agent extract mission: I was really missing more AT as there were BMDs everywhere. So maybe equipping Knight with another AT like Bishop had? Map had no forests where to hide and BMD AI used to love getting on top of terrain from which it had a good overview.
• In the Ultimatum mission i really missed Arsenal. I think Arsenal with equipment giving player some unorthodox options how to approach this mission would be a great addition as this mission was clearly about players ability to asses the situation in detail, asses equipment at hand and choose an approach that suits player style. Imagine sniping the patrols from central building with .50 cal, or use ATGM like TOW-2 with HE missiles to take out snipers and MG nests to clear path, mortar pit with laser guided munition and Bishops UAV do the guiding, or maybe even Pookie's UGV addon? In the spirit of realism with the mission situation - In my opinion it would be great to place a CDF truck in CDF HQ with Arsenal or multitude of special equipment giving player choices. This mission was born for this i think 😄

But those are only small suggestions. Campaign is outstanding as it stands now. Bravo!

[AZCoder 921]

On 4/24/2021 at 12:11 AM, Flanky said:

Bishop had AAF UAV controller (instead of NATO one) in missions: Agent Extract, Dead weight and Pravda - I saw this bug was already reported but even after the claimed update i played the campaign just yesterday and problem was still present.

 

 

Are you able to extract AZC_GOA_Functions addon that came with the campaign? If so, look for AZC_GOA_Functions\scripts\LoadoutsGOA3.sqf and loadBishop, should be _unit addBackpack "B_UAV_01_backpack_F". That's what I am seeing when I extract the Steam version. Just curious. Maybe I have another script overwriting it in the mission. I hope not, but possible. Also, I'm converting to a new loadout system under functions\loadouts with one file per character. It should also be correct, but I don't recall if I made the switchover yet. Working on 3 campaigns at the same time and losing track of what I did :-D

 

Regarding the helicopter on Tanoa

They are mercs after the bio-ingredients. They want to stop you and take it from you. I usually park under some trees and fire GP-25 rounds at the helicopter when it comes in close.

 

Yep that medkit was missing from the blackops kit, thanks.

 

Ultimatum:

Not sure I follow. Once he speaks to you, you can just leave. The popup only occurs if you get close to enter the building, a way of saying hey, you don't have to do this.

 

Fireworks: I have a GTX 1080. I think there's something else going on. The only time I had 3 FPS during the fireworks was when running the recent version of Blastcore, otherwise it's 20+. If it still dogs for you without blastcore, there must be some bad script that randomly freaks out. I will be refactoring the scripts eventually, like I am doing with the other campaigns. It's a long long project unfornately, but seems to help with how the missions run.

 

Good idea in Pravda.

Yes in Agent Extract, the BMD never used to show up in town. Then I added the AI mod and they can get really aggressive. AT is good idea.

 

I'll consider arsenal options, at least on Pecher. In past campaigns I tended to give more options, but found it was complicated to maintain and build. Then players would ask for weapon x to be added, so I decided to just give them what they were assigned.  But you make a good argument, so I noted in my tasks, thanks.

 

 

 

 

[spotter001 82]

Ok, just completed the campaign. 
Superb story telling.
 

Spoiler

I now feel sorry for killing Denmark, need to see the other ending:) But his reputation was really bad indeed hahaha

Great scripting, production quality is so good i can only imagine what you could do with a modern and better game engine.
Huge plus for voice acting. Overall, a huge thank you for putting so much time and effort into this content. You should start a career as a game producer!

Some notes about the missions:
 

Spoiler

Seal training - nice idea, however, why Mk11 for CQB?:) Appropriate weapon would be Mk18.
Dead weight - perhaps the best Arma 3 mission i played so far. This was amazing in every way. Production quality reminds me of the CoD. I couldn't get the camera feed but nevermind. This mission is the highlight of the campaign for me.
Lost at sea - original and atmospheric!
Agent extract - completed this one without firing a shot but it was tense all along, good job.
Pravda - interesting moral dilemma! I disobeyed the order:)
City of Death - brutality of urban warfare is felt.
Absolution, Mysterious signal - Great story telling.
Ultimatum - perhaps too many opfor near the target building? It felt like a Rambo movie 🙂
VDV missions - game year is 2020. So they should don a modern Ratnik uniforms and equipment, 6b43, 6b45, Sh112, AK12 with some modern optics such is Kashtan.

To conclude, this is something every Arma fan should try out. Attention to detail and the sheer amount of content must have required a lot of time.
I wouldn't mind if you switch to the smaller, mini campaigns in the future. For sure, i'll play anything you release!

[AZCoder 921]

4 hours ago, spotter001 said:

Ok, just completed the campaign. 
Superb story telling.

 

Thanks, it means a lot to me to hear from players like you and Flanky.

Just for explanations, in seal training, he was supposed to have a single shot rifle to avoid accidentally overshooting someone and being disqualified. Somehow I think he still got an automatic LOL. Mk18 would probably be best and just let the player keep it in single fire mode. As far as VDV missions, I used what RHS defaults to for VDV. Did they add Ratnik since I released?  I forgot, I did change the uniforms. I used what I found aesthetically pleasing at the time, and to differentiate your team from all the others. I don't think RHS has the Ak12 yet. Other than uniform I kept it mod default.

[Undeceived 392]

Started playing this and I need to control myself not to read the thread, because the story is fantastic and I don't want to stumble on spoilers. Superb campaign, storytelling and presentation so far, I love it! 👍 Huge amount of work on the scenery, which makes everything very believable. I believed that I was at a funeral in the United States and in a prison. Lots of small and big details.

 

Spoiler

The guy on the toilet was great and Denmark dismissively asking: "Where is that?!" when the officer mentions a mission on Tanoa. 😁 And that volcano of course, very impressing.

 

A bit of feedback:

 

Spoiler

In the mission with the temple I couldn't see the ship at the end because it had become dark (pitch-dark). Drove the boat straight to the marker and crashed into the ship, thus dying in the last 0,1 % of the mission. Is it possible to add lights at the rear of the ship? In the second try I approached from the side (and slower of course) and did see lights on the bridge, but at the rear would be good as well.

 

And a very important question:

 

Spoiler

Where the hell did Denmark find his hat? 😁 Suddenly he had it.

 

[AZCoder 921]

23 hours ago, Undeceived said:

Started playing this and I need to control myself not to read the thread, because the story is fantastic and I don't want to stumble on spoilers. Superb campaign, storytelling and presentation so far, I love it! 👍 Huge amount of work on the scenery, which makes everything very believable. I believed that I was at a funeral in the United States and in a prison. Lots of small and big details.

 

Wow thanks a lot!

Regarding first feedback, yes. Will add lights to my todo list.

 

Regarding the 2nd, he ordered a replacement on Amazon.....  Honest answer: I was not going to use the hat in the campaign at all. As I got later into the missions, it felt wrong to see him without the hat so I put it back in. The original was lost in a Russian dark site prison (guards kept it), so he would have had to find another from NAPA. I had planned to explain it, but I was already cutting out content because the campaign is so freaking long.

 

 

[johnnyboy 3741]

On 7/3/2021 at 5:10 PM, Undeceived said:

Started playing this and I need to control myself not to read the thread, because the story is fantastic and I don't want to stumble on spoilers. Superb campaign, storytelling and presentation so far, I love it! 👍 Huge amount of work on the scenery, which makes everything very believable. I believed that I was at a funeral in the United States and in a prison. Lots of small and big details.

True praise indeed for this campaign, when it comes from such a renowned mission creator as Undeceived!