Sunday 16th November - First C3 Fun Test

[BazookaBoy]

Since the post I made lst night seems to have dissappeared (I bet I hit cancel instead of post or something stupid) here is the annoucement again.

The fist of the C3 fun tests will take place this Sunday. It will take place at the normal battle time and we will be fighting under our normal armies as much as is possible.

This week is a test of a new concept, a change in the objective system layout, balance between infantry, armor and air. A new island and the ACE mod with it's stamia, wounding and other new gameplay elements.

It is a lot of change but it is important to note that this is a test and no decisions are yet made on the format C3 will take.

To take part in the Fun Test you are going to need to have some extra mods/addons.

1) Firstly, you will need the Queens Gambit expansion. We apreciate that not all of you have it and this may mean that some of you are not able to participate this Sunday. We are sorry for this but in order to evaluate whether we would be warranted in making this a requirement for the tournament we need to test with it.

You can purchase it for around $20 in stores or it can be downloaded for a couple of dollars more from;


Sprocket (http://www.sprocketidea.com/zencart/index.php?currency=USD&main_page=product_info&cPath=1&products_id=16&banner_tag=AAInfo)

Please do not feel you have to purchase it yet if you do not wish to. We hope to make a decision next week on whether we wish to use QG for the future. If you haven't already done so please post in our Queens Gambit poll (http://www.arma-tow.com/forums/showthread.php?t=9172)

2) Next you will need the latest ACE Beta


ACE v21 (http://www.arma-tow.com/forums/showthread.php?p=82101#post82101)

If you do not have access to this section of the forum please contact

{7}45|MGen.Bazooka_Boy if you're on the Russian side
or
[2]1st|GSgt.DaMan if you''re on the US side


3) Next is the Mapfact editor objects, island and map services.


Mapfact Editor Update (http://mapfact.net/include.php?path=content/download_eng.php&contentid=660&PHPKITSID=441097b089d6d2840058af5fb27eedad)

Mapfact Map Services (http://www.mapfact.net/include.php?path=content/download_eng.php&contentid=621TARGET=)

Mapfact Island (http://mapfact.net/include.php?path=content/download.php&contentid=659&PHPKITSID=441097b089d6d2840058af5fb27eedad)

4) Last is the latest AToW Beta


ATow Beta Mod (http://www.arma-tow.com/downloads/@AToW-ACE-MOD-Beta.rar)

Then update via Yoma

Yoma Server Name: AToW - ACE Edition Beta
Yoma Addon Server URL: http://www.arma-tow.com/atowbeta

If you wish to join in on Sunday please start your downloads as soon as possible as unfortunately there is quite a bit to download. Also please post your availability in the normal way on the Battle Registration page.

I will get in contact with the Generals tonight to give them a briefing and enable them to do a little planning.

[[IRT]Super64]

There are a LOT of people without QG. What piece of QB is needed for the Fun Test? Can it be excluded during the Fun Test and not have an effect on our findings on everything else? Because few people will buy QB for a test battle when it may not even be used in C3.

[BazookaBoy]

We have had 52 replies to the QG poll to date.

27 people already had QG
12 people would get it if the tournament used a quality map which required it
13 people said they would not or could not buy it.

So approx. 75% of those who took the time to respond would be happy to use QG if it delivered a good campaign.

Unfortunately the QG requirement cannot be taken out of the island. We are not the author of it (and they have restrictions on its modification), do no have the skills to do it (that I'm aware of) and of course it would take time to do.

So if the 27 people who have QG could attend the fun test, we would get some valuable feedback and have as busy a fun test as I can remember us having.

We will then be in a better position to decide if we should commit to using it. If we make that commitment this would be the right time for those who have said they would buy it to do so. We can then also speak to the remaining people to find out what there objections are and try and address there where possible.

Those who do not have QG can still organise to meet up on Sunday and play, there is no reason to miss out on a game just because you can't join the fun test.

The last thing anyone wants is a long down time before C3. At present my suggestion is the only idea on the table which has gone further than a post in the forums. But I cannot say it will work as a concept until it has been tested. Hence the fun test on Sunday.

[{AToW}Ghost33]

Back in the day when I remember playing in an organized BF2 tournament similar to this one we have here the MOD team had extracted and packaged some of the files and such that were in some of the expansions for our play in the tourney. And as the tourney was donation based and they were not making a profit EA did not complain one bit. So for our Tourney we could fight and play with all expansions without purchasing them but during regular play without out tourney mod we still had vanilla BF2.

Is their not a way to do that with Queens Gambit in ArmA as well?

[BazookaBoy]

We have not approached BIS with such a request, but if the decision is made to go with QG I would have no problem with trying to get in touch with them to ask whether we could get a discount.

[Mickd{Ret}]

We have had 52 replies to the QG poll to date.

27 people already had QG
12 people would get it if the tournament used a quality map which required it
13 people said they would not or could not buy it.

So approx. 75% of those who took the time to respond would be happy to use QG if it delivered a good campaign.


The thing is though Baz how many of those 27 are still active. Im sure a number of them are but are all 27? Can you see behind the scenes who voted for what?

[BazookaBoy]

I'm afraid I can't through the forum, it may be possible through the admin page but I don't know how at the moment.

It is a fair point, but I can only go with the data we have, the poll was started about 2 months ago, so I would have hoped we have not lost loads since then.

[BazookaBoy]

1) You will need to create a mapfact mod folder

@mapfact

with a sub folder called

Addons

When you open the rar file you should see the folder structure of the files supplied, most just need to be extracted to the \arma\@mapfact\addons folder (make sure once you've extracted it hasn't created an additional folder e.g @mapfact\addons\addons)

You will also find in the MAP_3DEmap rar a file in a folder called MAP.bikey (23 August 2008) this needs to be extracted to

\arma\keys


2) Yes 2.19 is the released AToW we used for campaign 2. The development work for campaign 3 is being done on the Beta Version of the AToW mod http://www.arma-tow.com/downloads/@AToW-ACE-MOD-Beta.rar

As changes/fixes are being made all the time it is important that once you have installed the beta mod you keep it syncronised, therefore Yoma is required http://www.yomatools.be/ and the details you enter to keep the beta mod syncronised are

Yoma Server Name: AToW - ACE Edition Beta
Yoma Addon Server URL: http://www.arma-tow.com/atowbeta (http://www.arma-tow.com/atowbeta)

[[8]72|Pvt.SnowMan]

Historically our "Fun Tests" have been to tested new features of the up and coming campaign. With the now imposed requirements, is it a safe assumption that C3 will be based on a mod still in ALPHA?

If this is in fact true then it makes me nervous as to the likely hood of having a successful campaign and tournament. We should not be basing our tournament on a MOD that is still in ALPHA.
No offense to Barmy, Viper Maul, or the MOD team but we have yet to be successful over the last two campaigns in removing all the bugs. Adding an unstable base on top of a MOD still in ALPHA is not the way to go.

If we are only providing additional testing for ACE without being informed prior said testing, then that's another can of worms.


SnowMan

[BazookaBoy]

We are testing three main things


The integration between the ACE mod and the AToW mod. The currently available ACE mod is an Alpha but it is all but ready for beta and the core functionality is pretty stable from the testing that has been done to date.

For the test day specifically - a new objective system. Bigger zones, very short timers, completely linear network, hopefully delivering a more direct confrontation in terms of fighting and at the same to a reduction in monitoring and therefore increase in server fps (well I can dream)

Again for this test specifically - shifting the balance of play back toward prolonged infantry fights. Reduction in types and numbers of air/armour.


These are the headlines if you like for this test, there are other tweaks and such but they are really there to help with the three main things.

The requirements above are for this test only at the moment, no decisions have been made. There is a consensus between the council and the mod team that if ACE is available, stable and integrates well (i.e. doesn't break) our mod, it would be our desire to use it for C3.

[[IRT]36th|PVT.H00t74]

Is it such a good idea to push people to buy QG with ARMA2 around the corner?

[BazookaBoy]

Noody is being pushed to buy anything. We are simply testing with a map which requires it. If we decide to go ahead with using it we hope to make the decision in the next week. Arma 2 is at best going to be out in March if it is on time so we should get another full campaign in before then and possibly two depending on how long it takes to migrate the mod and give time for members to buy it.

The shortcut you will need is:

<path to arma>\arma.exe -nosplash -mod=@ACE-Alpha;@AToW-MOD-Beta;DBE1;@mapfact

[[IRT]36th|PVT.H00t74]

Aghh, I thought the release was sooner.

[Steveak44]

Just to be clear, Yoma is the only option to get the necessary files for Sunday?

The version of Yoma that was first introduced in ATOW worked great but the newer ones have not worked for me.

[BazookaBoy]

Yoma is certainly the easiest way (unless of course it doesn't work for you). There have abeen a few new versions of Yoma recently, have you tried the latest? Let me know what problems you get.

[Steveak44]

I'll get the newest one and give it a try. I was looking for a backup plan. I'm jammed with work 'til Sunday and didn't want to be bothering someone Sunday before battle with troubleshooting.

[BazookaBoy]

Well we were discussing last night that there is a few things to load so I will certainly try to be online as much as I can to help the people interested in joining in on sunday.

If if comes to it I'm sure we can get you the updated mod files as long as you have the initial AToW beta mod mod.

[BazookaBoy]

I'm in the process of putting up a test server up so you can check you have the mods loaded correctly. It will also running the mission so you can have a wonder around the island and do some recon.

This is a rough draft of the map to test the concept behind it, so there will be things that are not quite right, as good as they good be or how they would be should this concept be the one we use for C3.

We will hopefully run a 2 hour battle to give us a bit of time to resolve any issues we hit at the start.

Main points to note

We will be fighting over zones 2 to 10 as I have had to use zone 1 and 11 as the army's bases until I get work out an offshore base. So no going into or destroying anything in the enemy' base please.

We are using ACE so there are some things it would be wise to read up on

Stamina System http://www.arma-tow.com/forums/showthread.php?t=8543 basically the more you carry the quicker you tire, push it to far and you will collapse.

Wounding System http://www.arma-tow.com/forums/showthread.php?t=8542 quite a lot to this. One you really need to read to survive on the battle Field as long as possible.

Vehicles we are using ACE versions of the land vehicles (BMP, Bradley, Humvee, UAZ), although the air vehicles (AH6, MH6) are the normal ones we use in AToW. Stocks are limited so be careful.

KITS I've put together slots based on the new ACE units. Both armies have a mirror image setup of units, which will differ from your normal army layout, but are just for the testing. All units on both sides apart from snipers have iron sights.

Restrictions Standard kit restrictions are in place, plus there will be a limit (self enforced) of 1 AH6 in the air at any time for each army.

Objectives The objective system is very simple. There are 11 zones (we are using 9 for this test as mentioned above).

The Russians start with 1,2,3,4,5 and must attempt to take 6 then 7 then 8 etc

The US start with 11,10,9,8,7 and must attempt to take 6 then 5 then 4 etc

Zone 6 start neutral.

To capture a zone you must have 5 more players in the zone than the enemy for 30 seconds.

Known Issues

The ACE rucksack system is not fully functional with AToW yet so I have not been able to pre-populate it with items. But it is functional and you are able to add items to it through your gear menu by highlighting an item in your inventory and then selecting 'pack'. Not all units have a rucksack.

Some weapons start unloaded. You have the correct ammunition and simply need to reload.

The kits are balanced between sides as much as I could reasonably managed in the timescale. They would need further balancing checks if adopted for C3.

Hints and Tips

One of the aims of the concept is to promote larger and longer lasting infantry confrontations. The stamina and wounding system will help as will the size of the zones. But overall the first thing you need to do is slow down. Running headlong into the front line will not necessarily help you win it quicker. You need to dominate the area through team work and firepower.

Never go anywhere without your medic. With increased spawn times (nothing to drastic yet) and no MHQs you will not get back into the fight as quickly.

As zones can change much quicker, you are much more valuable alive in the area of the zone than dead or in transit, so think about your movement, do you have cover, do you know what is over the next rise, where is the rest of you squad??????

I'll try to be on line early tomorrow (although I'll be travelling back from out of town) to answer any questions and help people.

BTW we still have not had volunteers to lead each army so you might want to discuss who wants the role when you meet up tomorrow.

[BazookaBoy]

I'm just looking at the server map, I'll post an update shortly

Password for FUNTEST server is slim

[{7}9th|Pra.Lucan]

Quick question: where's the password for today? I can't find it. If there is one, that is.

DOH. I see. Nevermind me then.

[[A]1|Cpl.Cross]

are we going to have funtest this week and are we going to need the new ace release v23 ?

[{UN}Coolio (Retired)]

You wont need it this week, if you dont have yet you might download it anyways as you will next week.