this is a thread to pick up an earlier discussion about modmaking ideas leaving arulco and or otherwise drastically change existing features such as the story or the setting

key points are how to get rid of that broad deidranna
the country of arulco
and other specific circumstances particuliar to the original game's setting, game balance and general appearance

it's also meant as a brainstorming for various ideas into these directions.

and we can also pick up previous ideas that have been around but have no real place to be discusses seriously. Some of my examples are "ja2: one man show" or "ja2: Blitzkrieg" that would simply put a different focus on the game.

what doesn't belong here:
any form of ridiculous ideas. things that can't happen at all or can't happen within a reasonable timeframe
also no Spam, we'd like to have a productive discussion here.
examples are middle ages mods or zombie mods.

Interesting point here.
I have been thinking, for a very long time, about the following:

A regime/government controlled by big business - eg. Kingpin, but in a far bigger way.

Obviously, the country is dependant on the relevant industry. As you steadily destroy this business, and take relevant proceeds/income for yourself, his/her ability to respond to your attacks is reduced(financially), but resorts to ever nastier methods. These would have a very negative effect upon your standing with the loyalty of the population , therefore, you would have to try to 'second guess' the next move you make.

This takes me back to something I posted ages ago.

Two scenarios - one leading into the other.
First: Standard conquer the country/Island with as much detail as possible - eg: as you progress through the campaign, it becomes apparent that there is a bigger person behind everything - and it MUST be difficult, as there is big backing behind it. At this stage, money is no object and you are fighting an up-hill battle. Once this scenario is completed, there is no cut-scene, instead, you are immediately in the next scenario(country/Island) - new map and not necessarily towns/cities - could be blank - depends upon information gained from your previous campaign.

You would start this with the cash, mercs etc.. gained from the previous campaign - BUT - no income from it at all, therefore, you would have to be very careful about what you do initially (I would even suggest removal of the cheat mode if possible here!!), and progress through this scenario until you 'remove' the head.

If this was at all possible (one scenario leading into another) then with the development into 8 member teams - 24 total, then what is stopping this idea expanding into 2 teams of 6 doing the above, while the other two teams of 6 clobber an adjacent country/map? The adjacent country/map need not be controllable, but random results from what happens there are somehow affecting your own abilities to conduct the campaign at hand. It need not be the team sizes I laid out/scenario laid out - that is for discussion and input, but I am sure JA2 is nearly ready for a major divergance in campaign strategy.

My rambling is now over, please rip it to shreds as you deem fit!!

Regards.

ok here we go-
Preface: I won't do this -if someone else wants-you don't have to ask me - just do it -you don't have to ask me - but pls gimme the downloadlink when the mod is finished ;-)

Any Bruce Willis fans around? If so - here are some ideas for "Die Hard" goes ja2
a rather small mod- 10- 16 maps will do it

What will be the differences to Arulco-based mods?

1.
No AIM ,no MERC,no Bobby Ray,no money - a one man show - like the movie (for the sake of playability there should be some RPC's in the maps)

A. how to het rid of AIM

a)Recycle it - ever visited the F.B.I. "most wanted" site?
Change the AIM site to look like/similar the F.B.I. site - all mercs become wanted criminals/terrorists.
Mercenarys payment will be renamed to "reward" and player won't have enough money...

b)any part of the laptop one don't need/want for the mod could either be made "transparent"
or buttons get "disabled"

2.
Strategic map
All you need here is a row from A9 downwards.
Each sector will represent one floor of the building.
Scrap the old strategic map and take a picture of a skyscraper and place it over the strategic map.
Depending on your graphic skill you can paste it over a city map and get decent results.

Movement between the sectors via elevators and stairs (teleporter grids)

3.
gameplay/objectives - if you have to ask, go out and get the movie.

Trigger/flags
-have a look at NPC-scripting.
-to trigger endgame sequence (win) you can put Deirdranna in a room without doors in your last sector and kill her with a triggered explosion.
-to trigger a "sorry you lost the game" -sequence you kill good old Miguel the same way.

Cut-scenes
Either recycle them - interview,TV news .....
-or disable them.

Ok that's miles away from a concept- closer to a rough sketch.
But maybe some get an idea about what I mean when I talk about LEAVING ARULCO
With a little bit of creativity so much can be done....the more you know....the more you can do.




Bone

Allow the randomiser (the thing that sets the wandering weapons caches for example) to have a greater hand. Each time you started a new game it would create a new country in effect from a pool of available maps. Most NPC's etc would all have to be set @0 to allow them to appear anywhere on the list of maps they're likely to be, and placed in each likely map like Kingpin's Assassins currently are. Make sure every placed item is only 33% likely to be there but compensate by placing a lot more items. It's more fun if you don't know what if anything will be in the box; and much better if it's different every time. Same goes for traps and landmines. You get so used to where they are and avoid by second nature; random trapping and more variable enemy settings would prevent combat complacency and even add some re-play value I guess.

Will.
If you randomize NPCs it makes the story impossible to facilitate as players would find NPCs all over the place & quests would have no meaning & relevance.

Example.
If you intend to convey information about features, characters, quests this information needs to be made known to player before player stumbles into various sectors & scenarios containing characters without a clue of what's happening. Conversations just wont make sense.

No point having someone explain quests being located near Meduna .... it's all over by the time you meet them.

You cant do random traps & mines, these are map specific.

The idea of placing more items but with a lower percentage chance of appearing is possible, adding some variation from game to game but it's a long process on the editor considering the number of maps 220+ plus alternates.

Having a number of assasins or Mike types in random locations is reasonably easy as would be placing faction types with them to appear as bodyguards or elite group with an officer in charge. It's a nice touch but having the faction types appear randomly is not possible.
So it becomes like UC. There is a convoy, checkpoint or whatever guarded by a squad and sometimes an NPC is with them.

The one man team idea by Bone sounds kinda weird.
I would oppose it mainly because the fun of hearing all the mercs speeches would no longer exist.
It's just a killfest & soon enough so many corpses accumulate your solo character becomes a lonely superman.

a rather small mod- 10- 16 maps will do it
due to this the danger of turning the ae into a superman needs not to be a threat.

(for the sake of playability there should be some RPC's in the maps)

when info comes in a compressed format- every sentence can be important ;-)

@Bear - in my book you're one of the good ones!
But sometimes your way of thinking is rather conservative (no flame intended here).

To "leave Arulco" with a mod ,creativity allways struggles with 2 arguments.... the first one is:
"is it really possible this way? "

the second one is:
"that was never done like this"

personal taste is nothing to argue about.

Bone

There's nothing wrong with being conservative,bonechucker, as long as there's something good or-in this case-great to conserve.And to add to.

"Is it possible to leave Arulco?"
Yes, but IMO one has to go in another fictional country,preferably a neighbouring one(Tracona or "Karottistan","Kokofifiland",etc)The main reason for that is...the game world,the maps and the tilesets.Even admitting the modmaker does an enormous rework of the tilesets, things like sky-scrapers or very industrial environments are so not ja2
-like for that matter your proposition to play solo games.There are games where that can be done better than in ja2, so why would one modify ja2 for that?
The "trashy well-worn charm" of the ja2 world,as Bearpit likes to put it,the combat system so not like anything else out there and the
(almost-)alive chars,certainly look like something worth conserving.

You know,first time taking contact with the UBeditor,back when it appeared,and reading that pompous "I've got the power" they wrote in its manual...didn't know whether laughing or smiling bitterly was the right attitude.Power to do what?To make some beautiful maps and send them to Sirtech so that they make them come alive,setting enemies,triggers,adding hardcoded things?The power to realise the limits that using those tilesets imposes to mapmakers?To see you just can't do some things?

See,I'm all for "well-worn charm"-without necessarily the "trashy" part to be honest.
A more than noticeable attempt was made by the Wildfire crew in that direction-and mind they stayed in Arulco!And actually did something "that was never done like this"...which actually only has lead to earning them the reputation of being "on the dark side" (for making money of it) and being "full of sh.."(mainly because Sirtech has kept the secret and the tools for doing some of the things that make this game great to themselves,and they decided to do something anyway)Initially,my Reconquista minimod was designed to be installed over Wildfire 5.0, and bring some new story into that Arulco; it actually worked, but I gave up on that because at that moment I saw no way to put faces in the game and set correct coordinates,plus I couln't fix some things so..rather let them be than cut them out.

This Renegade Republic project looks like the next step forward in ja2 modding, a blend of old and new, tried and true.With the right pedigree too,given by Scorp.
And we're all hoping the 1.13 coding team can actually give us the power to make (some) things happen.I can already say some of the things will be spectacular, and already hear some conservative natures say "what happened to not too much,not too little, just enough?"
Nevertheless,some things are IMO still not worth doing, like turning JA2 into something it was not designed to be,or not capable ever to be.Even greatness seems to have limits.

@ Ursa Major aka Bearpit. The random trap thing works. 3 x as many but only 33% chance exist. Stops you being lazy "oh I know where they are" type thing. As for the NPC's I didn't mean that they should pop up totally random unless appropriate. If one is meant to be found in or around Alma for instance it should only have the possibility of appearing in the four Alma maps and maybe some of the closest rural maps. Where it gets complicated would be if you'd made an Alma possible from several different maps so the npc would have to be placed in all of those too. Doubt it would work really but it was nice idea at the time.

;-) excuse me AZAZEL but maybe you got something wrong-
I did not say that being conservative is a bad thing.
But beeing too conservative stops creativity...


Did I write something about making an ego shooter?......Did I ????? Where ?????
Did I write about trashing the JA2 style ?????

If you had read what I wrote.....and if you had understood it.....then ...maybe
you've had a chance to understand that I talked about creating a mod with a storyline which only needs 10-16 maps....and tilesets needed would only be some furniture and such

excuse me - what has this to do with this thread or my post ?

you have an opinion....thats nice ...do you allow others an opinion of their own?

ok folks -I thought this would become a platform for brainstorming and creative ideas .....
which
can actually be done....instead of some wild dreams which are dreamed in other threads

instead its turning to one of the "interesting discussion/flame-threads"

So let's dance !


Bone

p.s. @ Azazel - we're both not native english speaking ...so there might be the small chance that I misunderstood you....if so I apologise....
if not...
hey, whats wrong about a nice and clean flame war :-)
by the way Azazel.....what the heck was really new in wildfire...are you talking about the "not implemented drug-cartell idea" or are you referring to the number of bugs and crashes ?
If you truly say that wildfire brought "new" ideas ...then nobody will ever accuse you to be "creative" .....

p.p.s. @ Scorpion - would you mind deleting some spam - or do you like the "flavour" of the thread ? ;-)

Has to do with practicing...some kind of English,not flamethrowing.
So,would you mind doing a solo campaign in any mod, a short mission-based one if you prefer to call it like that,since it's practically already possible. In a way, every new map you enter is a mission,though there are are some other type of missions than just "bang them!"

I was reading some stuff about Larry a few minutes ago... what if you had a merc who, instead of getting stoned, had a split personality?

Sort of like a Doctor Jekkel & Mr Hyde complex.

In 1.13 you can 'call for reinforcements'. Is there anyway you can choose how many reinforcements you need? Kind of like choosing on an automtic weapon how many bullets to fire except you are choosing how many militia you want to enter the sector to help you.

Possible?

Of course in theory it is possible, question is how much effort would this require and wheather it is worth it.Heh,I called on reinforcements once, and never did it since then-ok,the battle was spectacular,lots of noise and auto fire and also lots of work to save as many of those poor bastards called to help as possible.

A very cool feature this one,only problem is it needs to be more controlable, too wild sometimes-needs to be tamed.
BTW,ever wandered why Scorp sais he didn't like the way those soldiers were placed on the edges in the original maps?They were placed like that on purpose, so the player cannot enter the sector on a corner and exit on the other side,avoiding the battle and avoiding the "battle lost" written in the history log too.Now comes a cool new feature like this one, and someone finds the rebels and proceeds to Drassen for example.Enters the B10 map,heading for Drassen, and finds under a duzen soliers there;thinks"ok,I was cautious,wasn't craizy to choose insane,brought with me at least a long range gun,what the hell,let's trade amabilities with them.A couple of turns pass,and... enemy reinforcements arrive-mercs are surrounded,some of them might even be injured...
Result:
1)player saves-loads wildly,winning with no glory.Iron-man,huh?Insane,expert...
2)player reloads save game from after recruiting Ira(<shoot,they kicked my butt>),enters B10 in the N-E corner,thinking <eh,what is this battle for anyway?let's avoid it,immediately exiting on the East side,waist of my time>)and -of course - 2-3 soldiers are there,right on the spot,placed on purpose in the original game with no reinforcements...Battle on immediately.Are we talking about a prudent player,who made a save after recruiting Ira?Are we talking about a bored veteran,or a novice?About one who wants to give 1.13 a chance?Or one of those that use alt+gabbi immediately,not even trying?About 6 IMPs squads with superguns and scopes?About one who edited the ini to hire at least 3-4 AIM aces with top notch guns,needing money?Or even about a player that doesn't want to start a fight unless he/she finishes it?
Kind of an abrupt start(don't you think?)when a great new feature (in itself) doesn't have the space to be exerced properly/gradually.

Warning: This reply may prove me to be a fraud. Stop reading now if you dont want that to happen..

You managed to describe me perfectly but forgot one last step.. After a) attempting to save and load my way through the battle, followed by b) using the cheats and still managing to get most of my mercs injured, there is a third step.

The third step includes lining up all the mercs under my control (and hiring more if necessary, and often it is necessary depending on stress levels) and having a shoot off. Some mercs refuse to fight the other mercs, so you get one of the other cold hearted ones to kill them off first.

I managed to create a brilliant fight between two of my hired female mercs (which really does show that us girls are cold heartless killers..) and as both of them were fairly wasted after trying to kill off the rest of their team members (and some militia) I was pretty impressed with how long they lasted firing off rounds at each other.

Finally, I find throwing a grenade at the mercs own feet a successful way to complete the whole death spree..

And that my friends is how I play JA.. Definately good at decreasing stress levels wouldnt you agree?

Hope to see some of your maps in RR,Vicky, and to hear more of what you feel about this game(and our craizy ideas)-be sure some of us are very interested.
I mean,they had a Linda Currie as a "level designer" for ja2, not only a "Norma Meltdown".

I did try my hand at map making but the results weren't that great. I think I might have to leave my contributions at voicing (poorly) and random posts on the boards!

yeah, random post at the board rule. i like that part of it too. where was i? aaahh yes...

Where were you? Obviously not on this board since this was your only post...

somebody kept me busy by writing questions about Cows in ja2 and such.

but if you compare my post count with the time i've been here, then i must be amongst the top-ten spammers

I guess I've been one of those rather psycho silent observers for some time.. I forgot I had an account here until I wanted to sign up so I could offer my voice to the RR project..

And I'm sorry I dont think posting about RR counts as spamming so we might need to take those posts away from your count..

most of my posts are outside this part of the forum

when the 1.13 project got started a long time ago, i wouldn't stop posting. but the guys that were around then, Muggsy, kaiden, Snap, we haven't seen them in ages.

now i'm running a bit of a project here myself. As you know.
and then once we're done here, i'm sheduled to stop posting here, offering some relaief to those that felt i suppressed their ideas and voices.

but maybe i beat 2000 postings before that ;-)

I once thought of a mod concept something like this...

If anyone has ever seen Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty you'll know that it was basically set in just one HUGE off-shore Oil Rig/Decotamination Facility that was overtaken by terrorists.

My idea was that each sector (for the most part) used takes less than fives minutes to treck across and is basically consisted of bridges, oil fields and so forth between the "occupied" sectors which are basically either manufacturing plants or something similar.

The enemy could be terrorists or perhaps a rogue government agency...

The sci-fi mode could have whatever we want... aliens or whatever we feel.

Again, it's only a small idea but it's a start.

yay this is a fun thread!

well then, here i go:

how about the following scenarios:

1. you and your small mercenary unit are stationed on a border post between two rivaling countries. one day, your post is getting attacked by unidentified and unmarked soldiers, obviously coming from the territory of the other country.

the stationed regular soldiers are killed, as well as some of your mercenary buddies. but a few of them got captured and taken away, including your best friend. you are getting knocked out cold but survive somehow unharmed.

when you awake, the incident has brought the two countries at the brink of an all out war, allthough the one country dements all responsibility for the attack.

after a little talk with the government of your employing country as well as your contractor company, you are given the critical task to take a small commando unit on the search for your kidnapped comrades and the identity of the kidnappers.

the task is time-critical since the diplomatic confusions and accusations are about to lead to a full scale war, which would destabilize the whole region, involving some other neighbouring countries as well.

so you assemble your small team and take up the trace of the enemy, leading into the other country. on your way, you have to avoid any regular military opposition and detection through the armed forces, so you decide to disguise yourself as a hunting party, carriying only civilian grade equipment.

after following the trace a little while by asking a few NPCs, another incident triggers the war between the two countrys and you find yourself right in the middle of a warzone.

now your primary task is to survive on your own, eliminating all enemy resistance and taking on some crucial objectives by new orders, but still following the trace of your kidnapped comrades.

this trace finally leads you into the vicinity of a third country, where you find out, that the responsible force behind the attack and kidnapping is another mercenary unit and that your comrades are being held in a hidden prison camp on the third country´s territory, for interrogation purposes.

so you head off to that camp, fighting your way through border patrols and finally rescuing your surviving comrades from that camp, only to find out, that the whole incident was staged, to provoke the now ongoing war by

alternative A: a huge international arms dealer corporation which sells to both involved countries in order to maximize profits or

alternative B: a rivaling mercenay firm which wanted to create new demands for their services, dealing a devastating blow to your own company through letting it look like your own unit provoked the incident by brainwashing your comrades and obtaining confessions through torturing techniques.

in any case you will have to secure the evidence of that conspiracy by capturing the head of the enemy mercenaries and (alternative A) the agent of the arms dealer organization for a international war crimes court trial and to stop the war.

so you attack the secret, heavily defended base of the enemy mercenaries and either capture or kill their leader, finding the incriminating evidences you need, plus alernatively finding and capturing the arms dealer company´s agent through a little hunt, while he tries to escape to a small airfield for extraction.

when you accomplish both, you take your prisoners to a UN post where their confessions and the evidences are being broadcasted immediately, thus stopping the war and allowing you to finally return to your own base, where you are being celebrated and honored. or not. but at least paid well for your efforts.

great, intricate plot with some surprises and some critique on the mercenary and whole war fueling business!

here´s the second scenario:

you are part of a larger mercenaries platoon, operating in a ongoing war between two or more smaller countrys, i.e in an african or eastern european scenario.

on a crucial mission, your company gets attacked and mostly slaughtered, getting you captured and taken away for interrogation and execution, since mercenaries are not protected by any international laws.

with you, another comrade get captured, the rest of your unit is slaughtered, including the commanding officer. but a few others can escape and go into hiding in small groups.

so you find yourself in a prison cell after the first interrogation sessions. but since you and your comrades won´t break, your execution is being prepared.

luckily, your comrade is a lockpicking and knifing expert and in a lucky moment, he can manage to break out of his cell, freeing you too.

now the two of you have a chance to escape and survive, so you manage to overwhelm a guard with a self made knife, obtaining a pistol and a nightstick plus a uniform and some pepper spray plus some keys.

you then take on the next two guards, obtaining a second pistol, nightstick and uniform, without sounding the alarm.

now you have to stealth your way out of your prison wing and ultimately out of the military prison you are in, since the enemys are too many to take them head on.

but on half the way, your previous victims are found an the alarm is sounded, leaving you no other choice as to fight your way out.

luckily you manage to get hold of some silenced SMGs and a tranquilizer gun plus some body armor, tear gas and gasmasks from a weapon rack nearby and now stand a chance against the first incoming guards.

you manage to get out into the surface area, now swarming with enemy patrols on full alert.

you now need to find a silent way out of the prison compund and escape to a somewhat secure location.

then you have to find a way to contact your headquarter to inform them what happened and that you are still alive.

just outside the prison camp you meet another of your previously escaped comrades, who has tracked your trace to that prison camp, trying to find out if you´re still alive.

he tells you, where you can find a radio transmitter nearby to contact hadquarters.

it´s a small military post with only a few guarding soldiers. your comrade is a sniper and managed to keep its rifle and most of his gear, so you stand a good chance against the guarding garrison.

you then head off together, avoiding the searching patrols of the enemy, making it to the transmitter post.

you manage to take out the guards, getting hold of their equipment and managing to contact your people.

they give you some infos about the suspected whereabouts of some of your surviving comrades and give orders, to try to meet up with them and then extract to a safe location for regrouping.

so you quickly head off, since the enemy patrols are already on your trail.

you fight your way through the enemy territory, finally meeting up with 3 more of your lost comrades.

then you fight your way through the enemy lines to friendly troops, and finally getting back to a forward base.

there, you recieve new orders from your headquarters: first, rest and recover. then, since you are the highest ranking surviving officer of your company, use the funds given to you to recruit and outfit a second group mercenaries of your choice to finaly carry out your primary mission.

that is, to destroy a huge forward military fortification ( or SAM/missilebase) of the enemy, allowing your sides airforce to attack and you getting extracted by helicopter.

so you head off a second time with your new team with you on the lead now.

you manage to get dropped behind the enemy lines once more, only to find another of your comrades thought dead.

he tells you, that one of your first companys mercs was a traitor, who was paid by the enemy to give away the position of your company, leading them into a trap.

now your second objective is, to find that traitor and find out, who the mole is in your mercenary firm, who is the double agent for the enemy and paid the traitor.

you are given the information, that he presumably still is in the military prison you escaped earlyer, since he was captured on purpose together with you.

a great coincidence, since now you have a good reason to get some revenge on those who tortured you earlyer!

so you head off to the prison manage to storm it and have your revenge, liberating some captured friendly soldiers whilst at it.

but the traitor merc isn´t there anymore.
you are being told, that he was driven away to that very enemy stronghold which is your primary target anyway.

so you head off, now aided by a platoon of friendly soldiers (militia), which manage to guide you to a hidden camp, which now serves as your home base of operations for a limited time, before it gets found and overrun by the enemy.
there you have the chance to grab some supplies and rest, before heading off towards the enemy stronghold.

with a direct head on assault, you would stand no chance against the massive fortifications.

but nearby (two tiles away) happens to be a important power plant, which is also guarded by the garrison of the stronghold.

so you decide to stage a diversion attack on the power plant, to draw out a big portion of the enemys garrison and towards the plant.

when successful, your main group attacks the fortification at a weak spot, eventually succeeding in overwhelming the remaining garrison and manning the stronghold, using its defenses against the returning enemy mainforce.

doing so, you manage to kill off the huge attacking enemy force plus reinforcements, keeping the stronghold, cutting the enemy frontline troops from supplies and thus allowing your own troops to ultimately break through to you.

additionally, you manage to find your traitorous comrade within the stronghold, get hold of him and finally extract into safety, fullfilling your mission and helping to finally find the mole in your organisation. great praise from your employers, a huge promotion and payment raise are your well earned treats!

i have an idea, not really a contribution for the storyline but it would be cool if it had this: if u ever played gta san andreas, when u walk into a gun shop u can go through sort of a "challenge", a shooting range challenge (sorry if this word doesnt exist, i dont speak english). you could have that in ja, kinda like the boxing ring challenge with king pin. one idea would be to shoot at a barrel of fuel or even a civilian (not very realistic). anyway, u take it from here... hope its still a living project (and unfinnished) and im not making a clown of myself :p

there's no appropriate thread for these things... this thread's been dead for a while so

i like bayonetting




and i'd like some new cursors, at least something for sniping would be cool



(i also made a new cursor for shooting with just "iron sights" but can't find a screenshot right now)


there's so many little additions that would be fun. Cursors, tileset/0 stuff, animations...

Rock and roll!!!

The bayonetting looks cool as does the sniper cursor. We'd also need a thrusting bayonetting animation but even without it - very freakin' cool.


Now for the hard part.


Where are the coders to do this stuff?

now finishing the bayonetting anim cleanly is probably a very hard part too, especially becasue i'm on other things right now and left it to rot where it was.

then there might be ways to portray sniper cursors but all of them require certain compromises so i dropped that idea. But i keep my iron sights cursor for i simply liked it ;-D

it might be possible to portray new cursors in the shape of a minimod.

if the next official release is actually a stable milestone thing and not rendered obsolete a couple of days after release, we can start with the minimods anyway. But chances are it's just as buggy and untestet as most "official releases" lately so i'm postponing minimod ideas until i get an engine worth using.


and of course, true additions to the gameplay remain in the realms of my thoughts and imagination too.


when it comes to anims, i personally would prefer some that add to the gameplay. Bayonetting, i made this anim for the looks of it, it wouldn't add much.

There are oter things that could be used to add much if implemented correctly.

loved the bayonet , didn't like the sniper , too black , large and clumsy.

the only purpose of this cursor was to show the idea and maybe also make people think about new cursors themselves.

clearly, someone could design a better-looking image of a lense. And i do hope someone will.

I think bayonetting holds a lot of possibilities for mods set in vintage eras and even opens the door to weapons being used as bludgeons.


If you were rushed at close range by someone with a jammed gun or no gun at all I'm sure you would use whatever was in your hand to whatever advantage you could.

Noone thinks about possibly damaging their gun when being bum rushed.

But the other use for bayonetting as a feature is that it opens the door to polearms, and generally using your weapon in a way the game currently does not offer. The tricky part for coders would be that some weapons would suffer more damage than others when used in this manner so that would mean another tag in the weapons.xml or perhaps a whole new .xml.

But the potential rewards and subsequent mod possibilities make this feature very much worth the effort.

I think it is high time we get a few new features into the game instead of endless gunporn and mocromanagement features. Bayonetting is right at the top of my animation wish list at the moment (assuming the crouching and law animations are included already).

Oooh-yeah!
Me wants the bayonetting too. Y'know, I'm 5 maps away from finishing a revision of all the maps from SOG69...BeX had a fixed idea with those tropical maps from 'Nam. I'm only saying that from a technical point of view: the shores there in those maps are a little more than rudimentary. They got *pretty well with the lens of an old monitor like from 10 years ago, but now, on my 19" they look BAD.

Coming back to "bayonettes" - they should have been there, instead of the lasers that never got in...CQB at it's best, all in one weapon. That SOG 69 of mine desearves a 1.13.1000.

Who has it?
Doesn't matter, it's not for sale.
Nor release!
Anyway, not yet...

I think I gonna tinker with some cursers next. Never occured to me you could really. Like the bayoneting idea & yes it should also lead to bludgeon possible with rifle butt and even pistol whipping; gotta have some uses for an empty gun.

Could.Distance bad.
No pay, anyway.

Out of job these days,
Ozaziel

except for , possibly , the Village people .

I know , terrible really .

Don't forget to tinker.
I'm gonna release, this week maybe.
To at least 5 of those (of us) that see modding.

i'm surprised at all the reactions (not that i would understand all of them...)

i can make a screen from the other "new" cursor. And if you guys are familiar with the german ja2 board, i had a small number of different sniper cursor ideas posted there, but, i had to find out that it is awfully difficult doing anything that's not just cosmetic at this point.

don't be discouraged though, i guess there are many possibilities.

bayonetting: my first prototype will work just like one of the knifing animations. However, it is very difficult to do, and is only in a starting phase too.

az:

looking forward to your version of sog69. i only hear good things about sog 69 and i know what you can do.

Noone seems to be concerned with anything other than gunporn and inventory micromanagement these days.

It's a shame because some really cool projects are already started that just need the attention they deserve. Bigmaps and movable quest sectors come immediately to mind here.

you´re absolutely right Khor1255. there´s so much more mod relevant and fresh that could be done.

externalizations still are top priority and would require all the attention they could get.

another very useful thing for modding would be a moddable projectile animation. only then you could do things like lasers, plasma weapons and arrows.

also, the information content of the UI could be improved, especially through extended tooltips.

AI could be improved a lot more, make it use team tactics and use the sourroundings more, maybe even stick to certain tactical combat roles. revamping the detection and awareness system, so stealth gameplay really gets interesting.

new interesting tilesets also would be most welcome, but that´s mostly modders work.

and yes, things like bigger maps are most important and far reaching improvements that extend the modding possibilities to completely new levels and scales.

but what we definitely need the most is a stable milestone release as a somewhat stable and fixed modding base. you just cannot plan to take on a bigger modding project when you got a constantly changing base engine with new features added or changed almost daily.

personally, i like those new cursors by the idea, but i also think they could be somewhat impractical.

but 1.13 project should really watch out not to stry too much from its roots - to provide solutions to make JA2 engine more moddable.

all this cosmetic stuff and the new weapons are nice and dandy, but it´s the engine and core functions that are really important.

adding new features or improving existing ones is fine and all, but externalizations and corresponding modding tools are still the heart and soul of 1.13 project.

we need the means to build different storys and scenarios more easily, especially with all the small things that really provide the immersion. this is just crucial for really superb and fresh mods.

we need more scripting possibilities for more complex ingame events and triggers.

so cosmetic changes should be of the very least concern.

but it´s also a fact, that the community consists of many different people with many different interests and talents. some can only do the graphical and cosmetics stuff.

good coders are rare. so we basically have to take what we can get gratefully, even if it´s only less important tinkering.

because still every little bit helps to improve the project and everything that gets done can serve as a base and inspiration for others to pick up and expand on.

roundly and concisely summed up mauser ! We seem to be at the mercy of our only coders desires . Oh well , I'm sure eventually we will get what's required .

this is a fairly minimal change to the cursor used during bursts

it should indicate the use of iron sights



just because i refered to it earlier on.
cheers

another idea is to have mercs look/ peak around corners.
it is one of the features that many modern games have and that make some sense.





there would be some additional code required to shift the char a few pixels to the left.



such a feature itself would have to be developed step-by-step. At first because it would be an extreme advantage for the player side to actually "see" around a corner.

so what should be done is to soften down the effectivity of such a feature. Rather than seeing perfectly, the merc would only see partly and momentarily. There would only be a certain chance of the merc spotting any enemies, and depending on levels etc, the enemies would have a chance at seeing the merc and even interrupt (tossing a grenade comes to mind)

camouflage should play a role as well.

next steps would be to teach the AI to use this themselves, and then maybe move on to allow "blind" shooting around corners ;-D

this would have to be there because it is one of the few cheesy action movie elements that actually lack in ja2 ;-D

actually i´d like this feature very much.

and also add the possibility to throw grenades around corners.

which is a primary combat tactics in urban and inhouse environments. if you suspect an enemy around a corner, send a grenade too greet him first.

we´d also need one or two new buttons or hotkeys for this feature.