Resistance Faction controlled by Players

[SpanishSurfer]

I've seen other missions out there that are using ZEUS as a way to implement an RTS component into ARMA. I think it's time we attempt to implement this into BECTI. I'm guessing only our best devs will know how to attempt this.

How to implement this is something I've been thinking about for the past year, but couldn't come up with something. It hit me yesterday and I wanted to ensure this was written down.

To simplify how this will work I'll use a bullet format.

I. There will only be 4 resistance slots. No more are required than this. A. We can discuss how many players we will allow to fill these slots depending on the # of players on OPFOR/BLUFOR.

II. Resistance will have 1 base that spawns in a remote part of the map. A. 4-6 random locations will have to be selected for these possible base locations B. Bases will comprise of several tents, ammo crates, and other objects to give it the appearance of a resistance force. C. At the base, 2 technicals will auto spawn D. Players will have the ability to access an equipment menu when 100m within the base.

1. This menu will have basic weapons and ammo (RPG, 5.56 rifles ammo, binoculars, FAK, mines for AT/AP authorized and NO SCOPES NO NVGS NO THERMALS and NO TOOLKIT) a) The idea is for resistance units to rely on ambush to hurt OPFOR/BLUFOR vehicles. b) Equipment menu must be available so they can easily fill up a vehicle with AT mines. c) To prevent spamming of mines, we will have to determine how much $$$/min the player should receive. E. Players will have the ability to access the factory menu, but only to build basic rifleman (max of 10 / player) AND CIVILIANS.
2. Civilians will ALWAYS be AI and controlled by the player via commands.
3. Civilians will serve as shields for resistance units. a) If a civilian is killed by ANYONE (resistance, OPFOR, BLUFOR) they will incur a massive cash/point lost. (1) -$5,000 loss and -50 pts ??? F. When a base is destroyed, a new spawn location will pop up 10 minutes later.

III. Resistance Players will have the ability to go ZEUS when a resistance town is activated by either team. A. Fog of war must be implemented. Meaning a player will only see what resistance unit AI can see. B. When in ZEUS, they may not move more than 500m from the town center of the town that has been activated. C. Ability to remote into an AI shall be available and nothing more. D. Player will only be allowed to go full ZEUS if within 100m of base.

[SpanishSurfer]

Who wants to tackle this?

[thecoolestname36]

IMO this will be really hard. Not that I dont want to do it, cuz i think it would be cool, but it will be alot of work. I think we should somehow divy this up between multiple people?

[DanielVF]

As fun as this is, there's three ways I think it could go wrong. Perhaps we could design around these:

• If the human resistance only attacks one of the sides (OPFOR or BLUEFOR), which is quite likely, then it's going to major imbalance between the teams. There needs to be some game mechanic to force, or heavily incentivize the human resistance to switch who they are fighting.
• People are going to want to play the resistance. For half the server day, if there were four resistance players, then they would outnumber the people on a regular side. We'll need to update the anti-stack code.
• Currently when playing OPFOR or BLUEFOR, your lines of communication are mostly safe. Unless there is an enemy jet/cas/attack helo in the air, you can purchase vehicles in base and have them drive to you, and outside the AI's bad driving, have them reach you in the field. No more if you have resistance lurking around. Time will have to tell if this is fun breaking.

This looks like a lot of fun, but as the coolest said, a whole lot of work. It's possible we could still have this much fun, with much less work, by paring the scope down.

Heck, the minimum viable product for this might be:

You spawn in a truck. Truck contains 1-3 RPG's, 0-3 mines, 0-5 explosive charges, and a couple grenades. Your spawn location is random, with the guarantee that it is within 3K of a BLUEFOR/OPFOR or active resistance Town. Because the spawns are random, this balances out the human resistance between both BLUEFOR and OPFOR. This also makes for more spawns near the side that has more towns and is in the lead. Having only a random gun and gear feels very resistance like, since beggars can't be choosers.

Later if, we want to add more, we could add random empty civilian vehicles or boats, and ammo crates that spawn occasionally around the map and notify the human resistance.

[SpanishSurfer]

Ok not a bad start. Let's start with something easy like acalc suggested. Simple truck spawn with gear in it at a random location. If they die, 10min respawn at another location. This will sell the importance of stealth and the desire to not die. We can give them the ability to buy crates at resistance towns and X amount of money per min plus standard $$$ for taking out targets.

Thoughts? On Mar 24, 2015 8:07 AM, "Daniel Von Fange" notifications@github.com wrote:

As fun as this is, there's three ways I think it could go wrong. Perhaps we could design around these:

• If the human resistance only attacks one of the sides (OPFOR or BLUEFOR), which is quite likely, then it's going to major imbalance between the teams. There needs to be some game mechanic to force, or heavily incentivize the human resistance to switch who they are fighting.
• People are going to want to play the resistance. For half the server day, if there were four resistance players, then they would outnumber the people on a regular side. We'll need to update the anti-stack code.

• Currently when playing OPFOR or BLUEFOR, your lines of communication are mostly safe. Unless there is an enemy jet/cas/attack helo in the air, you can purchase vehicles in base and have them drive to you, and outside the AI's bad driving, have them reach you in the field. No more if you have resistance lurking around. Time will have to tell if this is fun breaking.

  This looks like a lot of fun, but as the coolest said, a whole lot of work. It's possible we could still have this much fun, with much less work, by paring the scope down.

Heck, the minimum viable product for this might be:

You spawn in a truck. Truck contains 1-3 RPG's, 0-3 mines, 0-5 explosive charges, and a couple grenades. Your spawn location is random, with the guarantee that it is within 3K of a BLUEFOR/OPFOR or active resistance Town. Because the spawns are random, this balances out the human resistance between both BLUEFOR and OPFOR. This also makes for more spawns near the side that has more towns and is in the lead. Having only a random gun and gear feels very resistance like, since beggars can't be choosers.

Later if, we want to add more, we could add random empty civilian vehicles or boats, and ammo crates that spawn occasionally around the map and notify the human resistance.

— Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub https://github.com/OFPSDEV/BECTI/issues/122#issuecomment-85470315.

[DanielVF]

Here's another approach.

Fundamentally, having players join a different side to play as resistance cause two problems.

• Huge advantage to one team or the other.
• Everyone is going to want to play resistance at least at first.

So what if we have the OPFOR/BLUEFOR players be able to go resistance?

Let's have a low mid tech required for this. (perhaps $25K cost, depends on Network 2, extra long research time, like the networks). Once this tech is researched, you have "contacted the resistance".

Whenever the enemy activates a town, a resistance "contact" appears on your side's map. (and spawns an ATV or Offroad and one to three civilians at that location). This "contact" is placed randomly 3-7km from the activated town.

If a player goes to this contact, they can see which town is being attacked, and "buy" a unit at the resistance town. This will spawn in near the town and away (200m? 300m?) from any attacking units.

The player is then placed in remote control of the new resistance unit. Since this unit is not a part of the town occupation squads list, it shouldn't block town captures. Perhaps spawn with a toolkit so you can take over damaged vehicles.

If the contact is destroyed, then you can't spawn in any more.

When you die, you have to rebuy a new spawn. Perhaps the price goes up each time. (On a per player basis)

FAQ:

Q: Doesn't this let you know where the enemy is?

A: Yes. Though in theory, only about 10 minutes earlier than you otherwise should have, and with the tradeoff that you are now 15 to 20 minutes behind on research. Also, to know the exact town, you had to cross the map.

Spawn ideas:

• Spawn as resistance
• Spawn as "Advisor" - Resistance side, but OPFOR/Bluefor gear
• Spawn with Offroad
• Spawn with AA (muhahaha).

[SpanishSurfer]

Sounds hard to code and the ability to see where the opposing team is a really bad way to implement. How about a script that forces resistance players to toss back between opfor/blue for activated towns?

No activated towns = random spawn location with a truck with supplies and some ai....player can do ambush missions

Activated town = option for resistance player to remote into random ai. Able to continually remote into all available ai until town is captured or ai are dead. The remote option pops up again only if other team activates another town. If the same team activates another town player can't remote in until he fills the role of a activated town by the other team.

We could use timers or variables to establish where a player stands on Activated towns, but you guys are better coders than I so you'll prob have better ideas. Thoughts?

And when are you guys done with school??? (-: On Apr 29, 2015 12:17 PM, "Daniel Von Fange" notifications@github.com wrote:

Here's another approach.

Fundamentally, having players join a different side to play as resistance cause two problems.

• Huge advantage to one team or the other.
• Everyone is going to want to play resistance at least at first.

So what if we have the OPFOR/BLUEFOR players be able to go resistance?

Let's have a low mid tech required for this. (perhaps $25K cost, depends on Network 2, extra long research time, like the networks). Once this tech is researched, you have "contacted the resistance".

Whenever the enemy activates a town, a resistance "contact" appears on your side's map. (and spawns an ATV or Offroad and one to three civilians at that location). This "contact" is placed randomly 3-6km from the activated town.

If a player goes to this contact, they can "buy" a unit at the resistance town. This will spawn in near the town and away (200m? 300m?) from any attacking units.

The player is then placed in remote control of the new resistance unit. Since this unit is not a part of the town occupation squads list, it shouldn't block town captures. Perhaps spawn with a toolkit so you can take over damaged vehicles.

If the contact is destroyed, then you can't spawn in any more.

FAQ:

Q: Doesn't this let you know where the enemy is? Yes. Though in theory, only about 10 minutes earlier than you otherwise should have, and with the tradeoff that you are now 15 to 20 minutes behind on research.

Q:

— Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub https://github.com/OFPSDEV/BECTI/issues/122#issuecomment-97485530.