Kujari: PMC ops

[accuracythruvolume 547]

UPDATE:  Now available on Steam!  https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1935519763    

 

This thread will document the features of a mission called Kujari: PMC ops

 

One of the members of my gamer group made the mistake of saying: "Hey remember that one mission you made a few years ago that had basebuilding?"   While I was like "Ummm, no?"  It implanted the idea of a dynamic basebuilding mission  and the question of "can I make that?"   Therefore work commenced on this mission.

 

Mission background:

 

You are part of the PMC group called Viper Shield.  The company has taken a contract in the Sahel area of Africa.   The sahel is the transition area between the Sahara desert and the Congo.

The sahel has become overrun with islamic militants.   To make matters worse, a breakaway faction of the French Foreign Legion has setup shop in the area and looking to carve out their own slice of the area.   The militants and the breakaway faction, hereafter known as the Lost Legion, have been battling for control of the area's villages ever since.

 

The Lost Legion, a dedicated group of hardcore military veterans in Africa, became disaffected after an incident where they became accused of inflicting unnecessary civilian casualties.  They maintained their innocence and yet faced court martial proceedings.  They decided to strike out on their own instead by entering a french base using falsified documents and inside knowledge of procedures and left with millions of euros worth of top end military hardware.  Recruitment of locals into the Lost Legion began almost immediately.

 

The mission is conceived as:

 

Stage 0:  Intro.  Viper Shield is inserted into the air via charted plane.  The players will choose a site to establish a base.

Stage 1:  Starting out.  The players gather resources to build up their base.

Stage 2: Mid-game:  Players begin doing missions.  These missions will garner faction status with the locals of the villages.

Stage 3: Take over begins.  Villages will begin to rebel against their rulers, and seek to join Viper Shield instead.

Stage 4:  End Game.   When enough of the area belongs to Viper shield.  The mission will be declared successful and the mission will complete.

 

This will be a long process.   Beyond one gaming session. 

Breakdown of the mission's features:

* Save / Load progress

* Player controlled basebuilding

* Full economy with multiple shops 

* Dynamic missions

* Events

* Player certifications and rankings

* Custom dialogs

 

 

Save / Load progress:

 

In order to support the scope of this mission, full saving / loading of progress will be supported.  This includes built base objects, vehicles, and player loadouts.  Storage cases will allow players to stash items which persist.

 

Basebuilding:

 

One of the core mechanics of this mission is dynamic basebuilding.  The players will acquire the raw materials and spend them to buy objects to build up their base.  There are eight materials:

 

Bricks 
Cinder Blocks
Concrete
Construction Components
Metal
Sand
Stone
Wood

 

These can be acquired in two ways.   

1) Players can visit any village and look for dynamically spawned objects and loot them for materials

2) A logistics mission can be spawned in which the player will drive a heavy lift vehicle to a shipping container that is packed with supplies.  The container will be picked up and brought back to the base where it will be unpacked for a large amount of materials.

 

Once the materials are deposited, they will be available to use to build up the base.  How the base is built will be up to the players.

 

Player economy:

As a PMC company, players will take on missions in the area.  In addition to earning reputation which the local villages, the players will earn money for successful completion of missions.   Killing enemy soldiers and vehicles will also earn the players money.    A shops system featuring 7erra's VASS is in place to buy / sell equipment.

 

https://forums.bohemia.net/forums/topic/219677-release-virtual-arsenal-shop-system/

 

Dynamic missions:

A full host of missions will be available.  These missions will be selectable by categories but the specific mission will be randomly chosen by the server from a pool of missions for each category.

Mission types include:  Logistics, Humanitarian,Civilian,Military, Illegal.

 

Illegal missions have the players doing..unsanctioned work.   While the pay might be good, other consequences of doing such work may happen...

 

Other missions exist.  Killed enemy soliders may or may not have intel on their bodies.  Collecting intel will spawn special intel based missions such as eliminating HVTs. 

 

Events:

Random events will occur during play.   Both the Islamic militants and the Lost Legion will attack towns they do not control in order to intimidate the locals.  This includes towns under your control.

In towns under enemy control where the players have earned more reputation than the other factions, the town has a chance over time to start a rebellion.  A successful rebellion will earn the town under your control.

Once the players have started construction of their base, word will soon spread and the enemy WILL send forces to attack.  This is the primary way to lose the mission because if the enemy takes over your base, the mission is lost.

 

Player certifications and rankings:

Players start uncertified in several areas.  Players can earn certifications by doing certain actions.  Earning certifications will also earn the player ranks in the PMC company.   

 

Certifications are:

 

Veteran -- Successfully complete missions.
Sniper -- Kill infantry with small arms > 600m.
CQB -- Kill infantry with small arms < 15m.
Driver -- Drive ground vehicles.
Pilot -- Pilot aircraft.
Demolitions -- Use explosives.
ATGunner -- Kill vehicles with launchers.
Gunner -- Kill things with heavy weapons.

 

Custom dialogs

A key way to support the desired functions of this mission will come in the form of custom dialogs.  This will take the form of the ultra proprietary patent pending  Merc 'n  Made Easy App   v0.0.1 (Pre-Alpha) (tm)

 

Here is a pic of the main menu:

 

 

The idea is the PMC members are all issued a tablet to perform these functions.  The items in the above pic from top left to bottom right are:

 

First Row:

1) Fast travel.   Fast travel system back to base or towns under your control.  Must have not enemies nearby

2) Messages.   Ported messaging system from (I think user JTS?)  Integrated to work with the dialog.  Send txt messages between players at any time.

3) Virtual Garage: Send a vehicle to your virtual garage.  Limits on how many vehicles you may garage is based on your PMC rank.

4) Virtual Garage:   Show a list of your garaged vehicles

 

Second Row:

1) Player save.  Save your personal data.  Loadout, garaged vehicles, rank / certs, money, etc.

2) Donation.  Give other players money.

3) Check reputation:  Check current reputation status of the towns between the three warring factions.

4) Player stats:  Check your own player stats.  Kill counts, money, certs, etc.

 

Third Row:

1) Apply for Commander.   Take the commander spot.   One player can be the commander at a time.  A high ranked player can bump a lower ranked player from the commander position.

2) Commander menu.  Special actions are done here like  establishing the base location, saving the server status, cleaning up bodies / destroyed vehicles, and more.

3) Build menu.  Start the building your base here.

4) Exit menu.

 

Requirements:

ACE, RHS, RHS GREF, Project OPFOR,Kujari

Optional:

AMF-- If the mission detects that the Arma Mod France is installed on the server, the Lost Legion faction will be overwritten with gear and vehicles from this mod.

SMA weapons pack -- The shop system supports SMA guns and accessories.

NIArms -- The shop system supports NIArms firearms as well.

 

 

More updates to come.  Hopefully this thread can be informative of the work in progress of this mission and inspire new and ever better ideas...

 

 

[accuracythruvolume 547]

Before I go deeper into the mechanics of this mission.  A moment must be made to give proper mention to some of the other armaverse users that have directly or indirectly helped this mission come into existence.  I will attempt to give credit where credit is due, although I may miss something here or there.

 

First off, behind the scenes this mission uses Zenophon's framework:

A great tool for any mission maker.

 

This mission takes inspiration from both antistasi and overthrow missions.    I went into the code of each and saw some bits that I liked and have been using them for awhile.

 

This mission uses GEORGE FLOROS GR's air drop script.   I nice handy way to get equipment in country!

 

Also by George Floros GR is his custom deathscreen script.  See number 1 on his list below:

 

 

Messaging system by jts_2009

Of course this mission would not exist without the many hours of Temppa's work.  Your maps are commendable!

Part of the logistics system comes from Vandeanson's work.  I fiddled with a few scripts to adapt what I needed to get a dynamic spawning system for looting base building materials.

And of course one must mention the legendary Engima.   This mission uses several of his scripts to create a dynamic, living environment.

I've integrated engima's civvies with phronk's fleeing civvies

 

 

The Real Bunc created a really neat dynamic camo script:

7erra made an excellent shop system that overwrites the default VA behavior.

Kujari is a dry, dusty place.   Alias makes a bunch of neat scripts and this one seemed more than fitting:

 

 

 

 

I'll update this post if I find / remember more

[accuracythruvolume 547]

This mission uses randomization to determine the initial state of two factions in control of the various villages on the map.   Below are a couple quick examples of the start of the mission:

 

Black for the militants

Green for the Lost Legion

 

 

 

 

 

[accuracythruvolume 547]

Here's how the reputation system will work in the PMC mission.

 

Each town will have it's own loyalty stat in regards to the three factions.  When you access the reputation menu from the main menu of the Merc 'n  Made Easy App   v0.0.1 (Pre-Alpha) (tm), you will see:

 

Simply select a town to view the current status of that town.   This does not necessarily reflect who is in control of the town at that moment, as rebellions can take some time to manifest:

 

 

You gain reputation by completing missions.  Complete enough missions and the residents will rebel.  This is a special mission where you will need to protect the rebellious locals from the ire of their current masters.  If they survive the rebellion will succeed and the town will join your cause.

 

You will also lose reputation by killing said civilians.  This will be counter productive to your overall mission and should be avoided whenever possible.  You will also be personally fined for said death as a blood money payment to the family of the deceased.  These murders are tracked on your personal stats as well.

 

 

Since Viper Shield has no faction status with this town, the current ruling faction actually loses standing for not protecting them and the other rival faction gains ground.

[accuracythruvolume 547]

A key mechanic of this mission will revolve around the players building the base up as it starts with little more than a flag and a small container to store items.   What it will grow into is up to the players.

 

Here is the main build menu.   It shows the current resources gathered.   All build-able objects will have a material cost to them.

 

 

This is the (incomplete) facilities menu.  Only the commander can build facilities objects.  Facilities can only be built once. Placement is important as they take up a bunch of space and a careless builder can build on top of other objects.

 

And here are the various objects you can build, sorted roughly by type. As can be seen, there are a lot of toys in the toolbox to play with:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

When a player chooses something to build, the object is put in front of them and collision of the object is turned off.  The player will get a "place" and "cancel" action:

*ignore the zero cost, testing purposes.

 

Once the object is placed, actions are added to the object to that will either destroy it or move it again.   Right now facilities cannot be moved once placed, so choose your locations with care. (maybe look into relocation options in the future)

 

 

 

[accuracythruvolume 547]

Base building is fed by the materials collection system.  There are two ways to collect the materials needed to build your super base.

 

The first way is to visit any town and find the dynamically generated items that contain small amounts of materials.

 

 

 

 

You can see the materials you have collected at any time when you close your inventory screen:

 

 

Go back to your base flag to deposit your materials:

 

 

And then they will be in the stockplie for use:

 

 

Oh, and the stockpile has physicality.   Let's say you went and collected a bunch of concrete.  Well, you have...a bunch of concrete:

 

 

 

Method #2 is to spawn a logistics mission.  This will create a shipping container full of goodies to go collect.  You'll need a heavy lift vehicle to bring it back.   Simply drive up next to it, load it on the truck, then unload it near your flag.  Unpack the container and you'll have a good chunk of materials all in one go.

 

 

 

 

 

[beno_83au 1369]

I'll be keeping an eye on this one. I got started on a coop, persistence campaign with base building but I guess I didn't really have a direction to take it in. I wanted to use a bunch of Alias' scripts and evolve it into using WH40K but I didn't really have a concept for it so it kinda fell flat. Although I did get my own all-encompassing persistent system going (gear, vehicles, player stats, damaged/destroyed terrain objects), so that was kinda cool.

 

Look forward to getting into this anyway. I didn't see it specifically mentioned, maybe I missed it, but I assume it'll be Coop?

[accuracythruvolume 547]

Yep coop.  It's my preferred style of play so I find myself designing systems for that type of game.  This mission is setup for up to 22 players.

[accuracythruvolume 547]

Time to cover the building of facilities.  Facilities are a special type of buildable object.  Each one gives the players access to something specific in their quest to quell the enemies in the sahel region.

 

This is what the mighty base looks like once it is established.   From humble beginnings...

 

 

You also receive a shipment of starting equipment to get you on your way...

 

 

This is the completed facilities menu.  Let's start by building a HQ.

 

 

Like building regular objects, you'll get a preview object that you can move around and place.

 

 

Inside you'll find a satellite phone.  The HQ is the facilities item that grants the base with the ability to request missions.  Simply use the ACE interaction menu, and choose a category of mission you would like.  The server will pick a mission from a pool of missions of each type. 

 

 

Beware that you can spam missions.  It's up to you to keep your players in check.   Each mission generates a random operation name (with something over 10,000 combinations available) then generates a random location for the mission, populates it with something to do / things to shoot.  The mission units automatically clean up upon mission completion or if all the players leave the server.

 

 

[accuracythruvolume 547]

In this post we'll cover the Black Market Weapons Trader.   Because guns, lots of guns.

 

 

Some facilities will give you a marker.  The marker is roughly the area the trader will occupy.  Take care to find a nice empty place with a bit of room.

 

 

You now have a black market weapons trader at your base.

 

 

The action on the trader will take you to the arsenal shop.   This particular trader only has easy to find weapons that are common in the area.  He also carries several launchers and useful misc items.

 

 

**But you promised lots of guns!**   Never fear.  The real power of the trader is his contacts.  Once you build the trader, the other traders in the black market network will become available.  They will populate in the buildings of nearby towns.  Their positions will randomize on server restart.

 

 

Each trader will be marked on your map with a random marker color.  There are several types of traders:

 

Black Market Dealer (Explosives)
Black Market Dealer (American Weapons)
Black Market Dealer (European Weapons)
Black Market Dealer (Russian Weapons)
Black Market Dealer (Weapon Accessories)

Black Market Dealer (Ammunition)

 

Note that while you can get many items from the black market, be prepared to pay for hard to find items.

 

The American weapons trader.  Prices are not finalized.  Notice NIArms and SMA weapons are an option.  If you do not use either of those weapon packs, you simply won't see them.

 

[GEORGE FLOROS GR 4207]

This is looking really a great work , especially for the dialogs  !

Keep it up accuracythruvolume ! 

[Jnr4817 215]

very nice

[accuracythruvolume 547]

Found this old reddit thread awhile back showing some MCLC action (Mine Clearing Line Charge):

 

Since there will be several missions involving mines, I thought it would be appropriate to try to get this feature working.

 

Did some work on the code and made some other additions and was able to get it working on a dedicated server 

 

 

[accuracythruvolume 547]

I'm going to cover the rest of the facilities here that you can build.   The method for the rest is the same as covered above, so I won't repeat the in-depth explanation and instead give a summary of what the other facilities do.  

 

For reference:

 

 

I've covered the HQ and weapon dealer so on to the next one: Paradrop services.

 

*** Building this facility will allow the players to do halo drops all over the map.  This is the solution I came up with to get players back in the action when they are killed.

On a related note.  A system is in place that puts death markers on the map where players die, with a timestamp.   This will help players get back to their gear in conjunction with the paradrop system.   You cannot paradrop vehicles...sorta, see below....

 

Next up is the Vehicle Services Facility.  This is a contract to rearm / repair your vehicles.

*** Building this facility will place a helipad on the map.  Simply drive over this object with any vehicle and it will rearm and repair it.

 

Starting on row two is the Paramedic.

*** Building this facility gives you a base medic.  This handyman can heal your boo-boos you've earned out there in the wilderness.  He also is the vendor for medical supplies and Food / Water (ACE survival).

 

Next is the Barracks.

*** Building this facility allows the commander access to the advance time mechanic.   Don't want to do night ops?  Just acquired those hard to find NVGs and want to use them to your advantage?   Nap it off and let some time pass.

 

This brings us to the Tactical Tailor

*** Building this facility gives you a clothing vendor.   A selection of stitched up goods are available.

 

The last facility on row 2 is the vehicle dealer.

*** Building this facility grants you a variety of vehicles... for a price.   Since this is the middle of nowhere, your order will be airdropped.  If your shiny new toy drifts into a tree and goes kaboom, you're out of luck, no refunds!

The vehicle dealer is its own custom dialog with sub-menus by vehicle type.  I'll leave this for players to eventually explore.

 

And finally this brings us to the last of the facilities.  This is the comms tower.

*** Building this facility gives you the ability to intercept enemy communications.

 

To demonstrate, when you get into a kerfuffle in a town you'll eventually get the following:

 

 

But if you have a comms tower you"ll get additional information:

 

 

This will come in handy, say for knowing when the enemy plans to attack your base....

 

 

[accuracythruvolume 547]

** Spolier Alert  **

 

Here's some pics of the vehicle dealer dialogs:

 

 

 

 

 

Hmmm what's this thing?  

 

 

And a seek peek of the aircraft purchasing system.  When you build the vehicle dealer at the base, the two airfields on the map will populate with a randomized selection of aircraft.  New aircraft will spawn to take the place of purchased ones.  They spawn Locked and unable to damage.  Buying them reverses these effects.

 

Looking down an airfield:

 

 

Inspecting a potential ride:

 

 

This mechanic functions fine on local multiplayer.  Not so happy on dedicated yet.  Work continues....

[accuracythruvolume 547]

Purchasable helis working on dedi now 😎.  Another mechanic struck off the to do list.

[froggyluv 2136]

Looks like a very, very nice mission - cant wait to try it out. SP as well?

[accuracythruvolume 547]

Due to the use of Zenophon's framework, this mission will require multiplayer.  Dedicated is preferred.  It can run in local multiplayer, so you could always solo the mission that way.

[accuracythruvolume 547]

Rebellions are working.  Any town that has a majority of faction standing with you and controlled by another faction has a chance to rebel.  This will spawn a special mission.  Your job will be to protect the armed citizens:

 

 

If successful then:

 

 

 

Also I have integrated Grumpy Old Man's dynamic pylon script:

 

 

Both of the airfields have a laptop where you can repair / refuel / rearm / change loadouts of pylon equipped aircraft.

[accuracythruvolume 547]

Here's the details on the Commander menu:

 

 

The top three are the advance time functions, in 8/10/12 hour increments.  The barracks facility must be built in order to perform this function.

First on the second row is the establish base function.   When you first start a brand new mission, use this to get your base going.  Cannot be near any town.  Other than that it's the commander's choice.  Want to plant it right on a road?  Be prepared to deal with the traffic.

Next up is the stockpile function.   Use this to set the stockpile location to your current location.  As the stockpile is physicality represented when deposited, it would be a good idea to select somewhere away from your important parts of the base.  This can be relocated as many times as needed.

Final function for row 2 is the purchasing of more storage cases.  As you go up in rank, you can buy more storage cases for the base to pack rat more gear.

Row three starts with...hmmm this one originally was going to be an establish outpost function.  Still debating on using this..might not make the cut.  And outpost would be a small composition that would serve as a fast travel point to somewhere else on the map, not near a town.  With the fast travel system allowing quick travel to any town you control and your base, this might be superfluous. 

Second button on row three is the mission toggle button.  Here you can toggle missions to favor nearby towns to your base or be map wide.  Not all missions apply.

Last row starts with the function to step down from the commander position.

Next is the cleanup function.  This will delete garbage dead units / ground items across the map in case too much junk is out there.

This brings us to the server save function.  This save differs from the player save as it triggers the server to save the current status.  This is how you save the base / your nearby vehicles / town status / etc.

Last function exits the commander menu and returns to the main menu

[accuracythruvolume 547]

Here is the player stats menu:

 

 

Kills are tracked on the left, other stats on the right.  Here you can see your dynamic camo stats.  This stat will update every few seconds while the menu is open.

 

 

An additional sub menu takes the player to the certifications:

 

 

As the player performs tasks, cert points are earned and tracked.  This is how the player earns additional ranks.  The above example is after playing a couple of missions.

[froggyluv 2136]

Love the stats and hopefully medals..  😄

[accuracythruvolume 547]

Testing of the mission continues... The donate function was broken and now fixed.   Missions moved to a new system which broke them, now fixed.   Working on some new missions like roadblocks (both having to man them or take them out).  It's pretty much playable right now, I just need to assign costs to all the build-able doodads.   Also moving them needs some tweaking, can't move the really big ones yet.... work continues.

 

[accuracythruvolume 547]

Work continues... lots of bug fixes and additions.

 

I've refactored the vehicle purchasing menu.   IFVs are now APCs and some vics moved around.

 

QRF teams added to the Lost legion.  They will either fastrope or quick land from a heli to deliver troops to troublespots.

 

Also working on ways to differentiate the two factions.  I'm likely going with the Lost Legion has access to helis and the militants can bring out armor.

[accuracythruvolume 547]

The enemy will now attack your base periodically.   If they can get close to your flag for a time, they will set charges and destroy your base, ending the mission in failure!

 

Militants will occasionally send kill teams against a random player.

 

More missions added...

 

Most features are now in place and are in the testing phase.   Just a couple of things to go for getting uploaded for more victims more players to enjoy!  

 

When your prized air dropped vehicle gets stuck on your comms tower.....