SP Mission: "A Different Kind of War II" by UbiquitousUK

[Alpha-Kilo 36]

I played version 1.3 and I really enjoyed it.

I think the sniper on the hill overlooking the airfield was a very good idea. But he should walk slowly on and around the hilltop because he wouldn't know from which direction any possible threats would approach him, don't you think? (Of course I approached from a direction which led me straight into his line of fire, but my advance was careful enough to survive. Without having read this thread I probably would have died on this hill.)

I played the mission twice. On the second time something strange happened: I wanted to destroy the tank and approached the barracks where it was waiting for the crew. I ordered the sniper (soldier #5) to attack the guards in the watch towers. To my surprise he fired with a missile launcher. Or the anti-tank guy reacted to my order, instead of the sniper. I have no idea how this could happen, because I really made sure that the icon of the soldier I highlighted showed the cross-hairs. Anyway, the targets were eliminated and later the Russians "lent" me one of their RPG launchers.

Apart from this minor thing the whole mission worked flawlessly. It was another great experience and I am looking forward to whatever you are publishing next.

I have an idea to increase the challenge a bit: Typically, a mission goal is marked "finished" when all threats in the area are dead. So the player knows he can run around without taking any precautions as soon as the sign pops up. If the mission goals weren't marked as finished, the player would have to be realistically careful at all times.

In this mission, it could be like this:

Objective tank: Obviously the task should be finished when the tank is destroyed. As it is, the winning condition seems to be tank plus lorry have to be destroyed, right? Either way, no written confirmation is required.

Objective airport: This is finished when the drugs are destroyed, no matter how many enemies are still running around.

Objective landing zone: Let the player call the helicopter by radio or with with a smoke signal. If an enemy has been overlooked the helicopter is in danger.

This is just an idea which came up when I played this mission. I don't know if it makes any sense.

[trickster1982 10]

Just completed this mission, really enjoyed it! I didnt take out the tank till after i'd cleared out the drugs factory, I found a box there with some tasty rocket launchers in & equipped one of my team with the huge one (forgot its name), as we were heading back to where the russian base is which i'd cleared out after the airfield previously, that tank came charging over the hills in the distance, before I knew what was happening there was a bright flash, lots of noise & the tank exploded about a mile & a half away,sweet moment!especially seeing it burning in the distance :cool: from there i sent 4 & 5 to the extraction zone to clear it out, while me & the others took that UAZ with the mounted grenade launcher to go find the documents! 4 & 5 kept reporting contacts when they got near the extraction zone, but I kept getting the "scratch one" & "he's down" messages so luckily they didnt get themselves killed without my assistance!

Kept hearing the tank letting off random machine gun fire all through the mission, I couldnt work out what it was firing at, but im assuming it was the chopper circling overhead?

Edited September 16, 2009 by trickster1982
Used quote tags instead of spoiler tags,numbnuts lol

[Undeceived 392]

Hi, I played this mission too and it's a very cool mission!

May I suggest some things here too? :) :)

I noticed that when the shit hits the fan, other enemy units in the region of the happenings never moved their asses to search for the enemy or at least be on high alert. For example the soldiers at the Russian base right next to the airport remained still and quiet after I blew up the drugs at the plane. They continued their normal, slow patrol up there, while down at the airfield it all was in flames. :)

You could put some triggered Search&Destroy waypoints to the airport, would be cool. Also on other units on the island, who don't move after big happenings...

Other than that I saw the evac chopper over the sea east of the island, and this all the mission long. An option would be to let it start from the carrier, which is situated south of the island (but I didn't check out if this works perfectly - just try it).

Edit: Ah, I forgot it: I think, one or two BTRs or BMPs wouldn't be bad. Because a "obedient" :) player will take out the truck with the crew on time and if this fails, there are more than enough AT soldiers on the island.

I really enjoyed this mission (and the first one too)! If you get some action after big booms in both of them, they would be even better!

Thanks for the work and keep it up! :cheers:

Edited September 15, 2009 by Undeceived

[Alpha-Kilo 36]

Undeceived is right: The troops in the base next to airport are indeed unrealistically relaxed. But if they rushed to help their colleagues, it would be harder for us to conquer the airfield and after the fight we would just pass an empty base. Would this make the mission better? (In your first mission there was an empty base and I thought this was a little boring. In my opinion barracks have to be staffed.)

I must say that the skirmish near the base took me by surprise as I didn't imagine anybody would be there waiting for my team. I really enjoyed this part of the mission.

I didn't see the evac chopper in his waiting position, but I agree with Undeceived that the carrier is the place where the helicopter would wait.

Additional APCs would certainly make the mission more challenging. But if we know what to expect, half the fun is lost. Could you perhaps make these BTRs and BMPs (and perhaps some armed UAZs) appear at random places in random numbers? These extra vehicles don't have to be a mission goal. So it would be up to the player to either fight or avoid them.

[UbiquitousUK 11]

Hey guys,

Thank you for the continued thoughtful feedback. Sorry I've been a bit sluggish in response: I'm busy working on ADKoW III, along with another mission more in the vein of "Sweep & Strike". (Incidentally, I'm also trying to finish my PhD thesis in the next week or two, but that's a minor matter :-D)

When I have a bit of time, I shall have another look at this mission. On the base issue: probably the way forward would be to have a compliemnt of 'scout' troops dispatched to the airfield to see what is going on there, whilst the main contingent is left to 'hold the fort'. That would actually be fairly trivial to have to implement, so no problem there.

I'm coming round to the APC idea. Once can set a probabilistic presence for the things so that the player *may* enounter one or two on his rounds.

Whilst the chopper thing isn't breaking anytihng per se, it's clearly a bit of an "immersion breaker" if it can be seen from the island. Hard for me to spot these things because my rig wont take a high view distance. Having it wait out in the sea until extraction time was the lazy option—I'll fix that with a proper solution, probably having it come from hte Khe Sanh carrier as suggested.

[frag 0]

Hi Ubi,

I saw the evac chopper as well wating in the middle of nowhere. I wonder if it could be related to the View Distance in the configuration panel. If you do a new version ...hide the little bird ;)

It is a great mission as I said in the first post of this topic ...

Still can't wait for AKoW III :)

[Greytega 10]

HI UbiquitousUK I really enjoyed this mission as I did the last one you made, took me about 2 1/2 hours to complete, I love the transition from day to night. I really liked the variety of objectives and the freedom to move around utes to complete any objective I wanted. I dont have much in the way of constructive criticism. i just wanted to stop and tell you how much I enjoyed this mission and that I patiently await your next piece of work.

[BAXXter 10]

Great mission! I wish i could customize my loadout at the briefing though...

Any chance you're going to make A different Kind of War III?