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Re: UC-1.13 Discussions and Bug Reporting (2013/03/07 to 201-/--/--)[message #355396 is a reply to message #355395] Mon, 22 October 2018 15:51 Go to previous messageGo to next message
townltu

 
Messages:384
Registered:December 2017
Location: here
As he mentioned the distance is ~ 30 tiles aka 300m
a range where a 10x mag does not have negative impact on shooting stationary human sized target.

Not sure whether the attachments mounted on the svu provide the same vision bonus as those on the M4A1, if so:

The screenie certainly indicates that at some time
somebody decided to nerf accurate shots with high power scope(in terms of JA2, not RL) mounted on SR so much
that their effectivity drops even below an AR using same zoom lvl with different optics,
that irl has worse image quality than the "real" one mounted on the svu,
which, i assume, additionally rests on the admittedly not so rigid legs of the grip pod.
(since range already went under radar: stance is prone :p )

Btw @bouchacha, there should be an adatper for russian mounting system to standard western rails,
which allowas to mount the M4's optics on the svu,
or better a svd-s for more versatility, folded stock, muzzle brake and holo sight transforms it into a cqb monster.


Meanwhile grenades can be trown for more than 25 tiles aka 250m,
thats ~ 10x the RL range of an avg soldier w/o equipment, a standard load drops that to 15-20m.

For a correct paper scissor stone mechanism,
SRs w high power scope should e.g allow to intercept nades during flight,
to either trigger or deactivate them on choice, but even that is not implemented. :D

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Master Sergeant
Re: UC-1.13 Discussions and Bug Reporting (2013/03/07 to 201-/--/--)[message #355400 is a reply to message #355396] Mon, 22 October 2018 20:56 Go to previous messageGo to next message
bouchacha is currently offline bouchacha

 
Messages:24
Registered:October 2013
Location: District of Columbia
I did test a 4x NV scope with the SVD but it had a slightly worse aperture than the M4. I never considered testing a holo sight with a magnifier on a sniper rifle, hopefully that *should* perform better than an M4 with the same equipment. That still doesn't leave much room for sniper rifles because sightlines in this game tend to be easily obscured because the game does not model tall buildings. You have to be lucky and either find a long street to park at the end of or constantly swivel in an open field.

Recently I did test out a Colt LE901 (7.62x51 precision rifle with 78 range) equipped with a FLIR sight (6x magnifier & very good NV). My guy was parked on a rooftop overlooking a long street and pinged at targets ~45 tiles away. Some were standing, some were running, but all of them were brightly lit by street lights. It was generally underwhelming. Despite 97 marksmanship, my guy missed about 2/3 of the shots to the torso AND each shot cost about 80 AP to make. That's as close of an ideal situation as I could create and it was rather mediocre.

Because of that, most of my toons have some version of an M4 with a 4x magnifier in their pocket in case they need it. Souped up you get a really fast (9 AP to raise) rifle with a decent range AND some semblance of longer range that's easy to swap in. The closest I ever got with the headshot game was with the holo sight from 15 tiles away. The way the game is balanced, it's really difficult to justify using anything else and sadly makes each merc hard to differentiate.

One exception to the differentiation issue is the Hunter trait. Good lord, give someone a Saiga with flechette rounds AND a 4x magnifier and they become a fucking beast. I saw no reason to use any other shotgun. I give this gun to anyone with mediocre marksmanship. Even Rosebud with 65 marksmanship was making one-shit kills on the regular.

[Updated on: Mon, 22 October 2018 21:00]

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Private 1st Class
Re: UC-1.13 Discussions and Bug Reporting (2013/03/07 to 201-/--/--)[message #355401 is a reply to message #355400] Mon, 22 October 2018 21:29 Go to previous messageGo to next message
silversurfer

 
Messages:2793
Registered:May 2009
You could experiment with the SCOPE_RANGE_MULTIPLIER in CTHConstants.ini. The default in JA2 1.13 is 0.7 which means that with a default NORMAL_SHOOTING_DISTANCE of 70 a 10x scope needs a minimum distance of 0.7 * 70 * 10 / 10 = 49 tiles to be used without a penalty. If you set SCOPE_RANGE_MULTIPLIER to 0.5 the minimum distance for the 10x scopes would be 35 tiles. That's still a lot so you may want to use 7x scopes instead for your sniper rifles.

I never use the 10x scopes in my game because the maps aren't big enough for such long engagement distances.



Wildfire Maps Mod 6.07 on SVN: https://ja2svn.mooo.com/source/ja2/branches/Wanne/JA2%201.13%20Wildfire%206.06%20-%20Maps%20MOD

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Lieutenant
Re: UC-1.13 Discussions and Bug Reporting (2013/03/07 to 201-/--/--)[message #355403 is a reply to message #355401] Mon, 22 October 2018 21:34 Go to previous messageGo to next message
bouchacha is currently offline bouchacha

 
Messages:24
Registered:October 2013
Location: District of Columbia
The only reason I tested a 10x scope was because the 4x scope was so mediocre on a sniper rifle. I wrongly assumed I needed *more* magnification

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Private 1st Class
Re: UC-1.13 Discussions and Bug Reporting (2013/03/07 to 201-/--/--)[message #355407 is a reply to message #355403] Tue, 23 October 2018 00:50 Go to previous messageGo to next message
bouchacha is currently offline bouchacha

 
Messages:24
Registered:October 2013
Location: District of Columbia
Some general impressions after maybe 100+ hours of playing this mod:
- Some maps are more fun than others. I think the draw of Urban Chaos is more CQB battles but this isn't really feasible with long parallel streets and blank walls. I think the buildings definitely could use more windows to add interest. By FAR my favorite map was NE Troy where it's completely surrounded by a fence, has three gated entrances, one main drag down the middle, but then an intricate maze of windowed hallways, rooftops, and rooms. It was glorious.
- Some maps are bizarrely set-up. What stands out the most is Prax Hospital and its entrance on the left side. The entire hospital is surrounded by a wall with no access to any rooftops on the top-left. I didn't intend to do this but my first encounter was when I rounded the corner and saw the entrance and inadvertently set up an interrupt factory. Enemies either would congregate further down the street or get interrupted to death once they walked out of the door. Surprisingly, no one ever threw a chemlight or launched anything towards my group packed in the 2-tile bottleneck on the left. 48 enemies died that night. The AI was generally really clever but they get easily cheesed with bottleneck features in maps. I don't see any way to fix it without making the maps significantly bigger and that's outside the scope of this mod.
- Despite the CQB focus, certain weapons get quickly outclassed. The M4 is certainly expensive but once you get it there's really no reason to use anything else, including 'quick' modern SMGs. I suppose this is realistic because the US Army has adopted it for a reason.
- Merchants are inconsistent. Is there any point to them besides adding flavor? I suppose they have a utility early on if you're desperate for a canteen or a backpack but most of the time they're way too inconvenient to access. They're not named and the behavior is not consistent, so to access them you have to run a merc over to what looks like a store, and then talk to the person behind the counter and HOPE they're a merchant, then HOPE that they have something interesting instead of string and coca-cola.
- This next feedback I don't really have a good solution to it, but the money is imbalanced. I found out that the optimal financial solution is to bumrush towards Port Kip and set up shop next to Tony. Then I just collect all weapons from my fights and use someone cheap like Raffi to cart them over and collect my daily $15k. Once I was in Port Kip, this was really safe to do, but good lord was it tedious. Meanwhile, my presence in Port Kip somehow triggered Kingpin to go hostile (I'm aware of the faction triggers but not sure what I did). It was a relatively easy fight in his compound and I was rewarded with $230,000+ in cash. No idea if this was intended but it reinforces the strategy of "Forget everything and go to Port Kip".
- Is Rodesa meant to be militia free? I cleared it out, found a casino, found out I couldn't train militia, then just moved on? It got recaptured and I didn't see the point of fighting the same battles in the same setting so I ignored it.
- UBT Travel is instant once you clear the stations but also tedious. I understand there are engine limitations at play but I often just made my mercs walk overland because it was as easy as "You, go there" instead of babysitting them through the gargantuan subway stations (seriously they're way bigger than anything a major city like NYC has, they're almost like underground malls. It's quite incongruent). Similarly, ordering things from Bobby Ray was also tedious because the 'crate' was often way on the other side of the station. I eventually solved both issues by cheating and teleporting each merc whenever needed. I saw no immersion or gameplay benefit to recreating my daily commute.
- Factory staffing. What exactly does this add? All you need is a merc with 60+ wisdom and they boost your factory income by 50%. There are a ton of really cheap options (e.g. Turtle, Carp, Gumpy, Weasel etc) that you can just park and forget about. I think games should move away from 'no-brainer' decisions. Similarly holy shit why are there factory injuries? This was ridiculous. I'd get a pop up that someone got injured overseeing my factory, activate them into a squad, go into the sector, press A (since they already had a first aid kit), press done, exit out of the sector, and re-assign their factory job. What does this add from a gameplay perspective?

In terms of bugs, it was the usual 1.13 stuff. I had frequent crashes, frequent infinite clocks (one consistently happened after I played first aid, another happened after I killed a specific gun runner, etc), and frequent items disappearing entirely. It was still fun! But I'm done with it for now.

[Updated on: Tue, 23 October 2018 01:03]

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Private 1st Class
Re: UC-1.13 Discussions and Bug Reporting (2013/03/07 to 201-/--/--)[message #355411 is a reply to message #355407] Tue, 23 October 2018 13:13 Go to previous messageGo to next message
LatZee is currently offline LatZee

 
Messages:185
Registered:December 2015
To return to NCTH stuff briefly, last time I forgot to mention two things. AFS/UC uses Base shooting range of 130, and while that makes weapons much more precise early when no optics are used, it kinda screws up the scopes in various ways. For example, it means that for 4x scope the ideal distance (ideal mag factor) is about 52 tiles. 4x scope doesn't even give you vision that far. That is even more pronounced with 10x scopes that already struggle with map size limits even with vanilla NCTH settings.

The other thing is that the problem you're having is probably not due to assault rifles vs snipers. I noticed the same thing last time I gave AFS a decent try and was having problems finding a rifle that would outperform the starting rifle (some modern .30 car, AR15 pattern rifle that i can't remember what it's called right now) for my marksmen. I think the problem is that AR 15 telescopic stock is overpowered and gives too strong a bonus to shooting. Try to compare in such a way that either both or neither weapon are equipped with it.

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Staff Sergeant
Re: UC-1.13 Discussions and Bug Reporting (2013/03/07 to 201-/--/--)[message #355472 is a reply to message #355411] Sat, 27 October 2018 17:16 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Wil473

 
Messages:2815
Registered:September 2004
Location: Canada
The AFS/UC-1.13 CTHConstants.INI was last modified in November of 2015, so I'm open to bringing things back towards stock now that v1.13 has implemented its own fixes to NCTH.

Extra civ merchants, strategic map facilities those were implemented for the sake of them being available in v1.1 - just like the tileset based mini-game system I've yet to figure out.

UBT Malls - yeah, that was my doing. Needed to rebuild all the UBT stations to stop the AI from climbing into the ceilings after v1.13 gave them that ability.

You should be able to train militia in Rudesa once loyalty is raised (it starts off very low, just like Balime in vanilla, though I don't think Balime permitted militia).



More weapon features and upgrade options, via (mis)use of v1.13 for vanilla Arulco, Dedrianna Lives! and Urban Chaos campaigns.

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Lieutenant

Re: UC-1.13 Discussions and Bug Reporting (2013/03/07 to 201-/--/--)[message #355487 is a reply to message #355472] Sun, 28 October 2018 08:19 Go to previous messageGo to next message
bouchacha is currently offline bouchacha

 
Messages:24
Registered:October 2013
Location: District of Columbia
I didn't know you rebuilt all the UBT stations, I must say they look very nice. From the standpoint of gameplay, some of them are quite odd and can be frustrating: lots of large plazas with long sightlines and no cover. It doesn't leave much of a choice except go prone and hope you're more accurate than the other side. The only request I would have is to move the Bobby Ray crate closer to an exit, or maybe just move it above land. I remember how confused I was at Port Kip trying to look through the "shipping offices" for my delivery, not realizing it was shipped via subway train.

What tileset based mini-game are you referring to?

Another question I forgot, how do you build fortifications? I had sandbags and a shovel (description said it was necessary?) but the only options available were wire and small and large debris.

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Private 1st Class
Re: UC-1.13 Discussions and Bug Reporting (2013/03/07 to 201-/--/--)[message #355489 is a reply to message #355487] Sun, 28 October 2018 15:39 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Wil473

 
Messages:2815
Registered:September 2004
Location: Canada
I was trying to add in a hack Danubia's bank mini-game using this http://thepit.ja-galaxy-forum.com/index.php?t=msg&th=23245&goto=347726& - although with cash not being a problem this may not be such a good idea, on top of me just not getting around to making it work. I'll see about adding Flugente's existing mini-game to one or two maps before the next release (the one to address the ammotype changes that have not made the SCI's yet).

UC-1.13 does not have support for the fortification feature, for some reason the sandbag tileset was removed by Urban Chaos' original team and I've yet to figure out a way to add them back easily.

[Updated on: Sun, 28 October 2018 15:40]




More weapon features and upgrade options, via (mis)use of v1.13 for vanilla Arulco, Dedrianna Lives! and Urban Chaos campaigns.

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Lieutenant

Re: UC-1.13 Discussions and Bug Reporting (2013/03/07 to 201-/--/--)[message #355495 is a reply to message #355489] Sun, 28 October 2018 20:39 Go to previous messageGo to next message
bouchacha is currently offline bouchacha

 
Messages:24
Registered:October 2013
Location: District of Columbia
Good to know that I wasn't crazy! The strategy map has tasks for 'fortify' and shovels and sandbags and barbed wire are shown rather prominently in item drops and on Bobby Ray's.

You're right about cash not being a problem. Tony pays pretty good prices for weapons (I was playing with 'enemies do not drop all'), especially if you hit up one of the gun runners depots and find $15,000 sniper rifles which we've already established are near-useless in UC. On top of that, Kingpin has a LOT of money and goes hostile on a hair trigger (I still don't know what set him off). Finally, all factory income gets increased by 50% if you have a cheap useless merc staffing it, and ALL factories go up by another 20% each if you have another cheap useless merc staffing the airport. The banks are pretty easy to break into and each branch hands out a ton of money with no apparent consequence.

My recommendations would be to further streamline it and get rid of decisions that add nothing to gameplay (e.g. staffing factories). Robbing the banks with no consequence seems to make sense thematically assuming they're holding the queen's money and not people's personal savings. If Kingpin is intended to have that much money, perhaps a hint at the beginning might be a good idea.

[Updated on: Sun, 28 October 2018 20:40]

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Private 1st Class
Re: UC-1.13 Discussions and Bug Reporting (2013/03/07 to 201-/--/--)[message #355581 is a reply to message #355495] Fri, 02 November 2018 00:35 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Wil473

 
Messages:2815
Registered:September 2004
Location: Canada
My intention is to get another quick experimental out for today's SCI_JA2v1.13_Revision_8633_on_GameDir_2449 on Monday November 5, the ammotype change basically means I can't put this one off for too long (and I have a long weekend that ends on Monday).

No promises but I'll take a look at toning down the facility effects later today.

Now if someone can do me a favour, I'd like to see what happens if ...\Data-UC113\CTHConstants.INI is deleted allowing the stock v1.13 to take over governing NCTH. Do the stock v1.13 NCTH settings reduce the effectiveness of iron sights to scopes become useful? Do the stock iron sights become unusable?

EDIT: I'm going to cut <usMineIncomeModifier> down to 105, there are four different facilities and I think the effect stack so staffing all four types will still have a big impact but not as egregious as it is now.

[Updated on: Fri, 02 November 2018 03:01]




More weapon features and upgrade options, via (mis)use of v1.13 for vanilla Arulco, Dedrianna Lives! and Urban Chaos campaigns.

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Lieutenant

Re: UC-1.13 Discussions and Bug Reporting (2013/03/07 to 2018/11/04)[message #355672 is a reply to message #355581] Mon, 05 November 2018 03:21 Go to previous message
Wil473

 
Messages:2815
Registered:September 2004
Location: Canada
Double Posting to announce new thread, locking this thread, and Experimental: Urban Chaos-1.13 Full Experimental 10 v4.6x 20181105(as it is presently November 5th somewhere in the world)

New Thread here: http://thepit.ja-galaxy-forum.com/index.php?t=msg&goto=355673#msg_355673

[Updated on: Sat, 02 November 2019 03:05] by Moderator

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Lieutenant

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