Mini-Mods

[hellfish6 7]

So I just got finished reading "The War That Never Was" for the third time.

The book is pretty much about how after the Cold War is over, many of the key NATO and Pact generals of the time get together to wargame a "what if" scenario of 1989. The book concerns a lot of naval warfare, but it also details some of the ground fighting. Specifically in places like the Bosporous, Libya, Norway and central Europe.

It got me to thinking.

What if we made mini-mods? Basically, they'd be a survey of all kinds of small unit actions from a hypothetical WWIII. Instead of people doing hugely comprehensive mods (Finmod, CSLA, SFP, etc.) they maybe only make two or three soldier models and a handful of weapons and vehicles of a specific unit.

For example, in "The War That Never Was" one of the battles is the Battle for Norway. One of the specific fights was Soviet Naval Infantry fighting Norweigian reservists outside of Bodo. Instead of mod teams doing hugely comprehensive mods about the Russian forces and the Norweigian forces, what if, instead, someone just made a handful of units - maybe three soldier models, a BTR-60 and PT-76 for the Soviets and three soldier models, an M113 and a M-41 tank for the Norweigian Reservists. You'd also have a small (6x6km or so map) that depicts a small fjord town in Norway.

You could make 3-4 missions with that setup easily.

Some key ideas for the mini-mods:

1. Multiplayer optimization

Everything should be done with MP in mind. No unnecessary scripting (huge burn scripts are cool and realistic, but can lag in MP, for example).

2. Keep it simple

Don't overdo it. Give yourself limits and don't exceed them. If you're only going to make three soldier models yet you really believe you need another because one of the ammo pouches doesn't quite work for a machinegunner, you're overdoing it.

A single rifleman model can easily be turned into a sharpshooter, AT gunner or an officer just by changing the weapon loadout. You don't need hyperrealistic models for each and every variant of each and every soldier - in an MP game you won't notice the stitching on the uniform or the fact that 5.56mm ammo pouches wouldn't be carried by a soldier with a 7.62mm medium machinegun. Don't sweat the small stuff! Don't go for hyperrealism - go for "good enough.

3. Keep it small

Goes along with points 1 and 2 above. Simple MP optimization is paramount. Don't use 5000 polys on a single soldier. Don't make hyperdetailed textures. Each addon pack should be roughly 20mb or less. Whenever possible, utilize pre-existing objects and textures that come with OFP or Resistance.

4. Include Missions!

Last but definately not least. Every pack should have at least four MP missions that ship with it. An even mix of adversarial and co-op might be best.

So where to begin?

1. Brainstorm pack ideas. Soviet Union v. Norway? 82nd Airborne v. Libya? Bulgarians v. Turks? Italians v. Yugoslavians? Conduct research of the pack - what weapons did each side have? What units and uniforms would have been available in 1989?

2. Register a common tag and create conventions.

Tag could be something like WWIII or MM.

Each pack would ship in a single pbo for ease of download and install.

Vehicleclass="Tag - Battle" (i.e. "WWIII - Norway") or ("WWIII - Libya")

3. See what's already out there and use it!

Don't reinvent the wheel! If someone has a solid PT-76 already made, don't make a new one! One of the biggest problems in the community, I think, is that everyone has their own idea of how to do everything. The have to build an entirely new model because of a small detail they don't like on a pre-existing model.

For the Norway example above, we can do this:

Get permission for FDF's BTR-60, CSLA's PT-76, and Combat!'s M113A2. Use Suchey and Earl's Russian Naval Infantry and the NFS Norweigian soldiers. Do some retexturing, repathing and consolidate the configs into one pbo and you've almost got a pack! Just add a Norweigian-themed island and some missions and you're done. Don't redo things that don't necessarily need to be redone. Keep new model building to a minimum.

Ideally, it should take 1-3 months to create a single pack.

The idea of this is that you could join a WWIII server and not have to worry about missing addon dependencies or wait for missions that will arrive weeks after the addons themselves were released. You should immediately be able to join a server, play a game in Norway, switch to Libya, fight in central Europe all in one session. Nothing extra to download - everything you need was in those packs. And the missions are included as well.

[snypa 0]

really good idea, I'll continue it a bit:

- soldiers. use 3 models: soldier, officer, machine gunner.

- scenarios: in all there should be different kind of theme: Norway vs Soviet union (winter), US 82nd vs Libya (desert), Italians vs Yogoslavians (old type west vs east in equipment).

- workers. Why not let everybody in the community to do they're efforts?

- scenario1: Norwegian soldiers can be easily made from Hyk's US winter soldiers (great winter textures). And Soviet Naval from ORCS models. (what pics I've seen about Soviet Naval infantry in Cold war, I think ORCS would be nearer then E&S). Combat! has great M113's, just winter camo. PT-76 from CSLA, just bit reworking with textures (like adding some snow), there's great alone BTR-60 addon by Norsu (same model then in FDFmod, just Norsu did it for them and released a russian version of it.) And if we want tanks for both sides, there is already T-64BV by RHS and several addons about Leopard 1.

- 82nd vs Libya. Hyk's desert airborne 1985? and use the model of Lost Brother's egyptians to make it Libyan.

- rest in the same way.

This sound's cool. I would like to help more if I only could model a bit better. I can model little bit, but no texturing (yet   ).

[jakerod 254]

I had an idea about a large community project a while back. Basically goes off of the same cold war thing but does require a few more units and such. It would be a lot of mods that would get together to make all the units needed.

PM me if you want more info I don't want to waste time posting something right now that no one really cares about.

Contacted CSLA about it about 4 months ago and they never got back to me.

[Tomislav 0]

in my opinion really a great idea, as i often don't even use that huge choice, and 3 different types of models would be enough for that

[ag_smith 0]

Some good ideas here. Overdoing and adding more and more never finished addons has been always a problem of many mods & addon teams.

The one thing that would make creating these minimods much easier is a collection of open-source models, that everybody could modify as needed without time consuming chasing down authors to get apropriate permissions.

A good example here is HYK Infantry. Hyakushi said once that it's enough to give him a credit if one releases any derivated work. We'd need a large number of different open-source addons to make developments of these minimods way easier. Belive me, it really takes a lot of time to get replies from many addon creator (especially CSLA :P ).

[wipman 1]

Hi, good idea, but i think that we need much more, mission makers (over all MP = coop) than addons we've alot addons to choose between, but not really a number of MP missions to play with 'em. Let's cu.

[@cero 0]

I Was thinking about the International soldier model by Matthijs.

Isn't that an open source addon?

More here.

That could do very well for some units if no all of them.

Then I was thinking about retexturing a cuple of other addons and use a good weapons pack, and that would be a nice little mod.

You don't even have to make a new terrain, there is thousends that are good enough.

I was thinking about a ficticional war between two ficticional sides

Regards.

@CERO.

[hellfish6 7]

Missions, I think, are the easy part. If you're only using the addons that are included with each pack, then you don't have to worry about addon dependencies and the like. If someone plopped a WWIII addon pack onto my desk right now, I'd have 4-6 missions ready within a couple days. They're not that hard to make.

If people could donate models to the project as open-source, then we could already do so much with it. We've got the Falklands mod soon for Royal Marine Commandos in Norway, French soldiers for the Force d'Action Rapide.... it's just a matter of condensing everything into small packages. You don't need 50 different soldier models representing 20 different regiments of a country's army - you only need three soldier models for one country. Any more would be excessive. And how many people actually use all those soldier models? 99% of the OFP players couldn't tell the difference between someone in the 75th Rangers, for example, and someone in the 82nd Airborne. So why do you need two different models?

And how many mods include good guys and bad guys? Very few - only BAS and FDF, as far as I remember. With mini-mods, you have a prepackaged, balanced yet realistic portrayal of a small cog in a big war machine. Sure the Soviets had 30 different versions of the T-55 or T-72 - but for mini mods, you only need one. Don't waste the time building the other 29 no matter how cool it is.

[franze 196]

This sounds like something fun to do - maybe make or add one or two special units, mini campaign around those, and use off the shelf addons for everything else.

[PainDealer 0]

really good idea. tho I'd like to see some of the on-going projects to finish first before all the modders run into new projects. that's happened a bit too many times.

[sander 14]

Hi,

This is a good idea.

To limit the size of a unit pack, one could even have a large part of the NATO armies represented by a single generic soldier model in olive drab fatigues and the WP units by a single generic soldier in olive drab with raindrop pattern uniform. With exceptions, many armies at that time issued camouflage clothing only to specialist units. An accompanying weapon pack could also be kept relatively small by using generic versions of the FAL, G3, MAG and MG3, variants of which equipped the bulk of NATO armies back then.

For those wanting to reskin the international infantry I have a set of templates to quickly add creases, pockets etc to a background of your choice.

Regards,

Sander

[ran 0]

But I think all this should be done with some standardisation in mind so those mini mods could be used altogether without any conflict/unbalance.

This wouldn't steal the job of the bigger mod/addon teams and would be somewhat complementary filling the relative gap built by the lack of "older" units representative of cold war era for exemple as most mods seem to focus on the last state of the art advancement in military technology in the armies they cover (i'm just slightly exxagerating there) but itwould be quite interesting as it could offer us the possibility to somewhat re-enact some past battles of more or less recent conflicts without much hassle.

The open source templates should be as complete as possible offering the possibility to addon makes to make a good use of model and texture hidden selections along with room for a few animations to make them even more unnuiversal.

[raedor 8]

i would really like such mini-mods.

i disagree with the scripting. there are some pretty nice scripted features (i.e. in FDF with the deployable MGs), which do not lagg or slow down a multiplayer session, imho it is even more fun with such things in MP. or the effects of FDF: ok, they are not cutting edge, but they're looking way better than the original ofp stuff and they do not lagg.

if someone starts such a mini-mod he should think about balancing the stuff

[MikkoFin 0]

Hmm just few questions popped into my mind:

Who would be running (Coordinating, making thins work and adjust values, armament etc.) this?

Could this kill other "mods" that concentrate in same area for ex. some specific coutry?

But if you get things work, we (FDFmod) can try to support you if needed.

[hellfish6 7]

Hmm just few questions popped into my mind:

Who would be running (Coordinating, making thins work and adjust values, armament etc.) this?

Could this kill other "mods"  that concentrate in same area for ex. some specific coutry?

But if you get things work, we (FDFmod) can try to support you if needed.

I wish I could say that I could head up the project, but I honestly can't. I wanted to throw out the idea, though - maybe someone out there could pick it up. I can help out with configs and mission making.

I don't think this would kill mods - I think it might even complement them. MiniMods aren't attempts to replace the full-spectrum mods like FDF or CSLA who model everything their respective country uses. MiniMods would concentrate on making compact MP-oriented battlesets based on specific Cold War era battles. If we were going to build a Finnish battleset, for example, we wouldn't want to build the whole Finnish Army. We might just ask permission to use 1-3 FDF soldiers, make them look like a specific unit (1st Sissi Regiment, 3rd Para Battalion, etc.) and give them a handful of vehicles (determined by what the specific battle is).

We wouldn't make anything beyond what the battleset requires. If we're making a Sissi vs. 103rd Guards Airborne Division battleset, we won't build T-80s, Leopard 2s, T-55s, or BMPs. We'd use whatever the Sissi might use (if they used any vehicles, though I'd like these battlesets to be balanced) and give the Russians whatever they might use (BMDs and ASU-85s for example).

And as I said, new model making should be kept to a minimum. If the FDF mod doesn't want to cooperate with a Sissi vs. VDV battleset, we might make a battleset instead with the help of a mod group who does want to cooperate.

It's also a good way for mod teams to release demos - like the Norweigian Forces Studio released some soldiers a few months ago. Instead of doing that, in the future they might integrate their demo with a MiniMod Battleset - so they contribute soldiers and a vehicle or two and another mod team contributes another set of forces. The MiniMod team integrates the two into a compact little set and makes the missions.

[jakerod 254]

I would be willing to help in the island department. I would prefer though if there were custom buildings for each area though because after using the same buildings and trees for the past two years its getting a little repetitive.

PM me or message me or something if you want me to help.

[snypa 0]

this came to my mind:

what if this mini-mod situation would be like this: the team would consist talented mission and island makers only. So, now, when we have that great need for missions, why not mods could give their addons to this mod, and the mod would make a island for them and missions for them.

what do you think, discuss...

EDIT: you see, one of the greatest island maker (Jakerod) is already saying he want's to join.

So now you only need coordinator and some great mission makers...

[jakerod 254]

A few thoughts...

Weapons... How would you do weapons? It wouldn't be very practical to include them in every pack so that you have bigger file sizes.

Aircraft... The same aircraft would be used in different places how would you go about doing that without doubling them up in the packs?

EDIT: Thinking maybe this is a better idea to incorporate into the beggining of OFP-2 or something.

[hellfish6 7]

A few thoughts...

Quote[/b] ]A few thoughts...

Weapons... How would you do weapons? It wouldn't be very practical to include them in every pack so that you have bigger file sizes.

I think JAM3/MAAM would fulfil nearly all of our needs.

Quote[/b] ]Aircraft... The same aircraft would be used in different places how would you go about doing that without doubling them up in the packs?

I'd skip on the planes. I'd like to concentrate on what OFP does best - infantry combat. Ground vehicles are secondary and I don't see much, if any, use for aircraft on the kinds of battles I imagine (squad/platoon-sized fights). And as I mentioned, I don't think the islands need to be very big at all - maybe 3x3km or so. Small enough to be very well optimized for MP play and big enough to fight over.

[jakerod 254]

Although I am not a big fan of JAM maybe it will satisfy me this time.

I think doing aircraft would be a good idea. You wouldn't need maybe but maybe 1 Fighter (CAS), 1 Attack Helicopter and 1 Transport helicopter would be good for each country. Obviously wouldn't have to be I love seeing the 3D combat between like tanks and helicopters while there are rockets from infantry flying at the tanks and such.

Well I think the first thing that is needed for this to be a success is a leader. Any ideas on that one?

[@cero 0]

I would love to see Zafana finally in good use.

Zafana.

Regards.

@CERO.

[ran 0]

I see it more as a bunch of individuals who instead of going head first in the 197th war against terror/marine pack/wwii full scale mod decide to put up some common effort in doing a small set of addons and missions, no need for a leader actually, once the base of the project is set up with a common weapons and ammo config and a few other standardized things, it would be up to the community members to take up a small project.

What's this need for a leader when half of these so called leaders can't even work as a team with their mod mates, let alone be productive ?

By adding planes and air vehicles we're already going too far. As hellfish says it would be much easier to limit these packs to ground elements as it's what OFP was ment for. And the CAS and other fire support need could be covered by scripts built into the missions.

By asking for aircrafts and custom island object models, you're loosing the main interest of the idea of these mini-mods by already making them too large and complex for what they're ment to be.

[hellfish6 7]

Exactly, Ran.

Edit: What I want to avoid is "version creep" - where you set your sights on a goal and then halfway there you decide to include another tank or soldier or weapon. You keep doing that until the project is six months overdue and your original plan is still not done and now you've got 10 new addons that you really like but don't add anything to your project.

EVERY addon maker and team I'm sure has run into this.

Basic plan -

3 soldier models per side

1 APC per side

1 tank per side

1 small island optimized for MP

4 missions

That's it. Nothing more, nothing less.

How many times have you played a mod and they've had like 100 different kinds of soldiers, and 5 different versions of each vehicle - some of which may never even have existed?

Now, how many missions or campaigns have you played that included even 25% of those addons? How many of those addons you looked at in the editor once and have never looked at again? I know I've got almost 2 gigs worth of addons that I've looked at in the editor and never used.

This is an attempt to recitfy that. Get the maximum amount of playability out of what's already out there, bundle it together with a balanced opposing force and give it to the masses for their online enjoyment. Do this over and over again.

If you're working on an American battleset and you've already got your M2A2 and M-1A1 but you REALLY want to have an M113 too, don't add it to the current battleset. Make a new battleset and use the M113 as your APC.

[jakerod 254]

Alright if there won't be custom island objects for it then there is no point in doing new islands. You might as well just use Nogova or if you don't want to use that use one of my ones that is already done and just change the names because there is not going to be any variation in maps what so ever then.

[-)rStrangelove 0]

I like the basic idea of Opf mini-mods. You don`t ask "What addons do we need to simulate this army?", you ask "What soldiers and vehicles took part in this conflict ?"

It's like building some addons for a mission pack instead of building a whole mod and wait for the community to produce a great deal of missions for it.

2002 nobody would've had this idea, nowadays you don't find good missions in a sea of addons.