Return of Fox

[Verdagon]

[Verdagon]

Okay the bugs you told me were fixed.

In mission 5 there was an area called "area 3 surprise" to add a little bit of difficulty. You informed me that it added too much difficulty, so it's gone
In mission 6 you were right there wasn't any credits. Sorry bout that!
Thanks for testing my mission.

By the way, how was level 4? Hows the story, gameplay, is it challenging? That one took the longest to make.

[BSlickOH]

Oh, mission 4. Forgot that I hadn't won that one yet.

The premise is fine, although when the level begins initially, I thought you were joking regarding how much I would have to do with so little forces available. Seems like I lost nearly everything against the first set of towers and vehicles that I had nothing left with which to go after the pads. Tried again, more carefully this time, succeeding in taking a pad, and then the reinforcements started arriving. Once that happened, I figured the level was winnable.

But the reason I haven't won yet is that the level pretty much ends at the 20-minute mark. I can takeover all 6 pads within 20 minutes without too much difficulty. Once it hits 20 minutes, it runs through a whole series of dialogs that basically ends up with "oh my god, they're everywhere" or something like that, and instantly ends the level. The first time this happened, I thought an enemy had taken over a pad when I wasn't paying attention. I've played it two or three more times since then, and each time it quits at 20 minutes.

So, since I haven't gotten to the point of trying to destroy the base yet, I can't quite comment on whether or not I have sufficient firepower remaining to do so. I don't know if there will be anymore reinforcements coming, but I'm guessing it will be cutting it close.

As far as your "area 3 surprise" goes, it's ok for it to be there...once. Once I've discovered the surprise, it becomes simply unfair after that point. Heh. Yeah, I'm a whiner. I can see having cloaked or hidden forces, that's fine. But once they are uncovered and destroyed, they shouldn't be there anymore.

Oh, one other comment I had for misison 5 is that it seems to almost play itself. I guess that isn't a bad thing inherently, but it does remove a lot of involvement from the player. One of the consequences of this though is that the computer-generated reinforcements don't take orders very well. Sometimes I'll try to hold them back, or deliberately route them around a group of enemies, but sometimes no matter what I do, they plunge headfirst into battle. In some cases, their goal is so far away that they don't realize they are being shot at right now. (Actually, this is a complaint I have about WI in general...enemy forces on patrol are smart enough to start shooting when they encounter foes....friendly forces are not as smart. A sizeable force can be slaughtered by a very tiny one just by virtue of walking past and never firing a shot. This isn't a huge deal with the sound on, since the sounds of battle can alert you that something is going on, but I typically play with the sound muted.) You actually provide a good quantity of computer-generated reinforcements, but since they don't take orders very well, you can't consistently reroute them and try to build up their numbers over time.

I'll think of some more comments, I'm sure. I've spent some quality time with mission 5.

[Verdagon]

Yes I have noticed that about mission 5... Ever played my map Tides of War? It's exactly like that. I don't know why they don't take orders, I wish they would.

Any suggestions you might have on how to make the player more involved would be helpful

The error in level 4 is probably just a misplaced win action. I'll get to it on sunday (I'm not at home right now, ill get back then)

Thank you for your help!

[BSlickOH]

Ok, if there is a trick to winning mission 5, I can't figure it out. I am able to wipe out all of the towers (that I can see and get to), a few power generators, and one vehicle factory. I can see one HQ, and a half dozen more power generators. But every time I get close to them, probably 100 or so enemies appear and just overwhelm my forces. I have tried throwing small fast armies at them, I have tried throwing large slow armies at them. It's like forcing a pencil into an electric sharpener too hard/fast.

There really is very little I can do while this mass of enemies trickles down the map. I've only found one nook along the canyon where I can tuck 5 or 6 vehicles and they don't get molested by the passing hoardes. So I slide some Broadswords up there, wait for the tail end of the army to pass by, and then send them rushing upwards to the nearest structure. This is easily a 10-minute-plus rotation, and frankly it starts to get old. But it does work, at least until you get up near the top of the map. There seems to be another spawn trigger up near the enemy HQ, and that's fine, but the number of enemies spawned needs to be a LOT smaller. There also needs to be a point after which they don't spawn anymore.

The "area 3 surprise" that I notice is gone, really wasn't a big deal...maybe 10 vehicles or so. I can deal with them, even if it means parking a huge army halfway up the canyon just to have forces remaining. But I am simply unable to defeat the massive enemy army in a strategic location. Even if I build every unit I possibly can, right up to the limit, get this army set up in the canyon, and then begin advancing on the enemy base, the enemy army is still able to wipe out every last vehicle I brought, and still have a sizeable force remaining. I've even tried sending 20 or so Eagles straight up the canyon on a kamikaze run, but they get ripped apart by newly-spawned enemies without so much as scratching any of the buildings. Too many enemies!

I have even tried setting up a 2nd HQ in the nook, so that my forces wouldn't have as far to travel. Makes no difference, and that HQ typically gets wiped out pretty quickly.

The spawned friendlies can keep this massive army at bay, typically without any intervention from me. So as far as I can tell, the only trick is to make sure to get vehicles up into that nook while the computer-driven folks battle it out. But once that trick quits working, there is nothing left for the user to do except ride it out and wait for the next cycle. I am at an impasse.

Possible bug: forces I create don't always show up on the mini-map right away. Once I get them moving, they appear, but not initially.

Comment: You actually start out with too much money. I set up the Dominion in the little cul-de-sac in the lower left corner. There is - just barely - enough room for the Dominion, one power generator, and one Galaxite processor. But as soon as the Bulpup comes back full, he can't unload because there isn't enough storage. No problem, I gots plenty o' cash, but sadly no real estate. You need the Bulpup to clear out the Galaxite to make room for more structures, but he can't work because you don't have enough storage, but you can't build more storage because there isn't room, and there won't be more room until the Bulpup does his thing, and .... and ..... and.... It works eventually, but it takes a LONG time to set up. So, I either need less money initially (not a problem, considering the rate it accumulates), or I need less Galaxite so I have room to build.

Incidentally, while I am worrying over getting all of this set up, the computer-generated friendlies are able to pave their way halfway up the map, including destroying numerous towers, without any intervention from me. I literally touch only Andy and the Dominion/HQ/Bulpup for the first 10 or 15 minutes.

I'm trying to answer your question regarding how to increase user involvement, and it's tricky. The first thought I have is to have the spawned friendlies remain in place at the edge of the map, instead of rushing off to fight, possibly with some alert like "reinforcements have arrived!" or something. And rather than 3 or 4 units every 30 seconds, make it 20 units every 2 minutes or something. But, if they are going to be stationary, then you definitely need to cut the number of enemies easily in half. It will be far too much to manage otherwise.

I'm getting a little burned out on this mission, so I'm going to play with #6 for a while. I'll wait for you to fix #4 before trying that one again. By the way, I think it is a lose action being triggered, not a win action. Or at least the dialogs don't seem very happy, anyway. Actually, I may just start the whole campaign over again and pay more attention to details.

[BSlickOH]

Ok, after slugging away at mission 5 for quite some time, mission 6 was actually pretty easy.

Same comment regarding money as I made previously...you're starting off with too much. $5000 is probably the max you want to start out with on a map with this much Galaxite/this little real estate available.

There aren't too many mobile enemy forces running around, so they are pretty easily dispatched. Andy alone could probably take care of them. When I first encountered towers, I noticed that they have low power. I almost went to destroy them, but I have played on levels before where destroying towers (or any structure) lowers the power requirements, thereby giving the other towers the power to work. So, I just left them alone, and walked my forces right past them. I then made a point of destroying only power generators to make sure that the towers didn't work ever. If this is deliberate, it's easy to beat. If this is a bug, might want to correct that.

When I discovered Fox, I didn't even know that's who it was. I just happened to have a few vehicles with me, so I sent them in front of Andy so Fox would shoot at them instead, and let Andy blow him away. Suddenly the level was over, and I hadn't even uncovered half the map yet. Maybe in addition to killing Fox, make the objectives change after that point to include destroying the entire base.

So, you probably have a fair amount of room to increase the difficulty on mission 6. Seeing as it is the "final battle," I would expect it to be more challenging than the others. I would guess that simply giving the enemy forces enough power from the get-go would increase the difficulty quite a bit. Although come to think of it, I did play this on "Easy." Maybe I should try again with a harder setting.

[BSlickOH]

Ok, I have started the campaign over. I just completed mission 1 on the easy setting. The only issue I found is one that was already mentioned...

[hpmoon]

It seems that you can play Level Two for hours on end without any progress. I've set up lots of rocket towers at the first river and have held off the last, biggest raid for an hour or more.

In short, does anybody know what the goal of this level is? Normally you try to destroy an opponent's base or, at minimum, to deplete their forces, but this is never-ending.

[joshlerman]

I am in agreement with all that has been said about level 5 -- it really does seem unwinnable, not matter what strategy I have tried. Not that a difficult challenge can't be fun, but it seems to me as if lightening the load would make it a more enjoyable, and winnable, level.

On a side note, I find that whenever I exit the game after playing this level, I get a fatal exception. Don't know what this is related to, but wanted you to know.

[Verdagon]

Okay here's the deal. I'm having a lot of trouble with my schoolwork and making my site, and I really don't want to spend any more effort on fixing this level.

around level 4 or so, I was so tired of making Warfare maps that I had to force myself through it just to be finished.

This happened in starcraft a few times too... I eventually got back to making maps. Maybe I just need a break.

I'm sick of this campaign , so if you guys want, I can make it open source and everyone can join in on fixing it. But please... DONT MAKE ME DO ANY MORE!

- Evan

[Verdagon]

[kayaker]

Is there an end to the generation of the Free Rads? Is there a "switch" I've missed, or are there a set number of waves?

[Verdagon]

[Verdagon]

[BSlickOH]