Frequently Asked Questions/Requests

[maturin 12]

What trick do missionmakers use when the objective is killing a large number of enemies? It is unfeasible to require that every enemy be killed, because a few demoralized survivors could run away and never be seen again, and a few could be hiding under rocks, too scared to move.

Is there someway to make a trigger with an area that activates if (for example) fewer than five enemies are inside it?

[kylania 568]

What trick do missionmakers use when the objective is killing a large number of enemies? It is unfeasible to require that every enemy be killed, because a few demoralized survivors could run away and never be seen again, and a few could be hiding under rocks, too scared to move.

Is there someway to make a trigger with an area that activates if (for example) fewer than five enemies are inside it?

Trigger OPFOR Present with this as it's condition:

{alive _x && !(fleeing _x)} count thislist < 5

[maturin 12]

That works great, thanks.

I have two quick questions still:

In a SP mission, how do you give the player a specific name that will override the profile name of each Arma 2 user?

And secondly, what scripting language should I use to make the player or HQ speak in the dialog menu with subtitles?

Edited June 21, 2011 by maturin

[kylania 568]

For the name, check out the notes of the setIdentity command.

For the dialog check out titleText.

[maturin 12]

Cool.

But titletext just adds text across the screen, as opposed to subtitles or radio messages in the usual dialog box.

Edited June 22, 2011 by maturin

[kylania 568]

Text across the screen are subtitles. :) You could use sideChat or globalChat for normal "talking"

[maturin 12]

And the hits keep coming.

I've been looking through a bunch of threads where people want to count dead civilians. The problem is, in my mission I need to count civilians killed by the player. Further complicating matters is that the civilians in question are actually OPFOR (Civilian units grouped with a Chedaki leader). They all have names for easy reference.

Is there some way to this with a simple End trigger?

[kylania 568]

KILLED event handlers on them that increase a public variable keeping track of their deaths and a trigger which monitors that number reaching a specific number maybe?

[maturin 12]

There's not some way to end the mission if anyone from a list of named units shows up in the player's kills in Statistics? This is a very rudimentary SP mission.

I promise after I get this mission released I'll stop biting off more than I can chew and somehow learn more sqf. (Although I'm not sure how. Most tutorials and wiki pages tell you around 60% of what you need to know.)

Edited June 22, 2011 by maturin

[kylania 568]

Wow, no idea how to access the "what you killed list" to be honest. I'd forgotten that was even there!

The learning is the fun part though. :)

[maturin 12]

I know that if you put a Russian soldier in a USMC group he will become BLUFOR, but is there any way to accomplish this in the init field?

Edited June 27, 2011 by maturin

[maturin 12]

Edit: Thanks, Nemesis, I've been using joinsilent. It works well but has its drawbacks, like the turncoat unit ignoring nearby targets a distant group leader is unaware of.

Edited July 4, 2011 by maturin

[NeMeSiS 11]

I know that if you put a Russian soldier in a USMC group he will become BLUFOR, but is there any way to accomplish this in the init field?

[russiandude] join americandude

http://community.bistudio.com/wiki/join

[maturin 12]

EDIT: I just discovered that it's not the language that is wrong. The trigger doesn't work because I have three extraction points with identical conditions. If I delete two of them, the third one works. But this is still a big problem for me. How can I let the player choose an extraction point, with different results depending on casualties taken?

{alive _x && !(fleeing _x)} count thislist > 0 && alive _unit

These are conditions for a trigger that works. It has type OPFOR Present, an area of 200m and ends the mission.

{alive _x && !(fleeing _x)} count thislist > 0 && !alive _unit

But this one doesn't work at all! Why can't I change alive to !alive?

They are identical in every way except for that stupid exclamation point. I am trying to make a trigger that ends the mission if the player enters an area AND one or more of his group members is dead.

Edited July 5, 2011 by maturin

[kylania 568]

BLUFOR PRESENT:

{alive _x} count units group unit < 5 && unit in thislist 

If the player is named "unit" and the group size is 5 that code will work for "Player is in the area and is missing one or more group members."

[maturin 12]

BLUFOR PRESENT:

{alive _x} count units group unit < 5 && unit in thislist 

If the player is named "unit" and the group size is 5 that code will work for "Player is in the area and is missing one or more group members."

Replacing 'unit' with the name of the player is not accepted by the formatting, in any combination. It demands a semicolon right after the unit's name. Could I refer to the name of the group instead?

And why can't I have multiple area end triggers with the same conditions?

[kylania 568]

What is the name of your player's unit? There's no combinations, you simply replace the word "unit" with the Name of the object that the player is using. Note that the word "units" must remain, that's not a typo, it's a keyword.

Why would you need multiple area end triggers with the same conditions?

[maturin 12]

What is the name of your player's unit? There's no combinations, you simply replace the word "unit" with the Name of the object that the player is using. Note that the word "units" must remain, that's not a typo, it's a keyword.

I'm confused. So in your example the player is named 's'?

The player's name is vas, and the player's group name is fugee.

Why would you need multiple area end triggers with the same conditions?

Because the player can choose which extraction point to reach. If he has taken casualties, the ending is different. Each point simply requires that an OPFOR unit be present and that one of three units has died.

Edit: Looks like my problem is that you can't have two triggers both causing End #1. I reworked all my triggers to simpler, cleaner distance methods and wrote a bunch of duplicate endings in my briefing.html to cover every combination. Thanks everyone for posting advice.

Edited July 5, 2011 by maturin

[NeMeSiS 11]

I'm confused. So in your example the player is named 's'?

He ment that you replace 'unit' with your unitname (in this case 'vas') and leave units as it is. ;)

[kylania 568]

{alive _x} count units group vas < 5 && vas in thislist

Have three triggers simply checking if the player is in them for the extract zones. Have those triggers call some script, end.sqf or whatever.

That script checks the status of the group and kicks off whichever type of ending you want via:

endMission "END1";

Here's a demo mission showing the scenario I'm talking about. 6 possible endings triggered off three ending areas and if the group lost anyone.

Edited July 5, 2011 by kylania

[Roan 10]

I´d like to test (preview) my missions with "beginner" difficulty settings to have 3rd person and all the tags and markers etc. available for a better overview of what is happening, how units behave and react...

How to change the setting for editor? It´s always running with "expert" settings.

EDIT: just managed it by myself. Hit ESC when mission is loaded and go for Options-> Game Options -> edit the difficulty setting you like to use (beginner in my case) -> hit OK with or without changes -> go back to the mission.

Edited July 11, 2011 by Roan

[kylania 568]

ESC within game, Game Options, Difficulty

[maturin 12]

How can I remove tank smoke launcher ammo?

removemagazineturret smokelaunchermag doesn't work. (With correct formatting)

[buliwyf 4]

How does your correct fomatting looks like?

[maturin 12]

How does your correct fomatting looks like?

It's copied from the biswiki and it worked for main gun ammo on the same tank. I assumed that smoke launcher ammo wasn't covered by magazineturret.