Silver Dawn

[JohnTC02]

Silver Dawn v1 is now ready for testing.

This is a new map built from the ground up using a clean version of the mission 08 landscape.

As this is a relatively small map there is no "large map" switch in this mission, the night switch has also been dropped as it was causing some issues, the night version is now back in the map list, I was able to find a way (as from my last mission) to include a night version without having to create a separate map, doing this only adds 5kb to the size of the bundle file.

Special feature:

Dotted around the map are "booby trap" car bombs, these are the only vans that have wheels, if you walk up to one of these vans you will see the "plant c4" marker you have 5 seconds to plant the c4 or they will explode (7 seconds after you see the marker) and probably kill you, planting the c4 will deactivate the booby trap, again these are the only vans that have wheels, if after you start to plant the c4 the yellow bar stops going across the screen you know you are to late so get out of there PDQ!!

Switches:

As usual this mission is adaptive, if you are playing alone you will be in Easy mode but if more players join then it will update itself and then be in Hard mode.

If there is more than one player the mission will be in Hard mode but if all but one player leaves, the mission will then be in Easy mode.

Easy Switch:

If there is more than one player then use this switch to play the Easy version (this switch does nothing if you are playing alone).

Hard switch:

If you are playing alone then use this switch to play the Hard version (this switch does nothing if there is more than one player).

Map name for dedicated servers:

coop_tc02_silver_dawn_day_v1

coop_tc02_silver_dawn_night_v1

All new updates will now be placed in this post so keep checking here for the latest version.

Thanks for testing and I hope you enjoy a lag free mission,

John

Download:

Silver Dawn v1.

[suneye2]

Test Environment: GRAW2 + Rahnmans MOD v4.01.

Graphic option: high-end.

...

Sliver Dawn v1

I was involved in the map server to test.

I feel like this map looks good texture.

Fairly trace of bullets looks OK.

However, the texture seems to be some problem.

The results of several quality control checks.

Broken down parts of the jeep door, you look up repeatedly.

The shape of debris was seen, is seen as a black shape.

Changed several times, saw the eyes of gamers.

The results appear in front of debris.

Jeep got shattered, but multiple shards.

The texture is more than one fragment.

In addition, the fragmentation of the border and shiny.

The capture of the scene captured by mistake and did my operation.

John, please make sure more of the texture.

That the effort was made this map.

Better results next time ...

[Note: The translation of the results.]

[RickDekkard]

Ok John, another great mission, very nice job. No issues so far.

Done in a bit more of an hour killing 163 AIs, in easy mode (alone), well not so easy when the server is in hard settings, .

Only two minor comments or suggestions.

1. A sniper can be added up there, covering the objective, could be deathly... (may be it is in position in hard mode, don't know)

2. Is strange that the bot under the stairs spawn at trigger 22 (just when one is going up the steps), maybe it can spawn at the previous trigger.

Again, nicely done John, thanks for your work.

[rahnman]

Hi John,

Tried this one out by myself on Easy and had no problems whatsoever. No lag issues or texture problems. Darn vans kept blowing me up. I tried to take them out with a GL but they were invulnerable. Having to plant the c4 on them is fine, however, I think it would be more realistic to make them vulnerable to grenades instead. That way they would function more like a real IED. Just a suggestion, either way is fine.

This map started out looking like one of your previous maps, however, the back side was much different and very nice indeed. I would like to see what you could do with the "containter ship" or "harbor" [the one Triplex used] maps since we only have one mission that uses those. Just a thought.

Cheers,

Rahn

[Spik@]

John,

I agree with Rahn....Make the vans vulnerable to grenades, BUT don't mention on which vehicles the IED's are when you release the map! Otherwise people will shoot them all and the whole idea the 'unexpected BOOM' is gone. Just mention there are IED's and that they can be disabled within a set time by placing the C4.

Maybe you could place more of the same vehicles without IED's too?

I must say I haven't played it yet, so I don't know how many of the vans are in the level, but as soon as people figure out which vehicles are boobytrapped, they will nade every one of them. Just place more to add to the confusion.

Looking forward to play yet another 'JohnTC02-original'

Regards,

Spik@

[JohnTC02]

Thanks for the feedback folks.

Rick, I'll see if I can place a sniper where you suggested as there isn't one there in the hard version, I thought the bot you mentioned did spawn at trigger 21 but knowing me I gave him the wrong patrol name, I'll check that out.

Rahn/Spik@, the car bombs required some complex scripting plus the van needed to be recoded to make it work as they are not classed as vehicles but are a dynamic cover prop, it's a bit late for this mission but I am working on something a bit different for my next mission which I hope will include random car bombs, each time you play the mission different vans will be active booby traps.

Having them venerable to grenades or gl is something I will look into, the problem here is checking when they have been destroyed using a grenade/gl, I will need to find a way to do this or the booby trap will still activate and try blow up the van when it's already been destroyed.

As I said, it's to late for this mission but I hope to have something different for the car bombs in my next map.

Rahn, I forgot about the harbour map, if I can clean it up by removing all the props/buildings it will give it a fresh look, I'll bear that in mind for a future map as I'm currently working on my next disaster.

Cheers,

John

[candy76041820]

Whoa, another map with IED's. They left me with psychological trauma ever since playing the Operation Terrorist map.

What about bringing Darvos landmines back into warfare? (Maybe in the next map, I know) Feeling a little missing shooting those little spike-like fuses and watching the explosion. LOL.

BTW, agreed with rahnman about the explosive-weapon-destructable IED's. Maybe you can create them like those "Plant C4"'s? (Not sure about that though, I'm not familiar with mission scripting.)

[kaapo]

Hi John,

we tried night first and see if we can try day tomorrow.

At the weapon loading screen I had 46 fps and Erikas E6750 had 51fps.

During the game we hat between 16 and 25 but as I said, we played night.

Anyway, I#m wondering what has changed to get frames like this because in the past even with huge maps we had enough frames.

Will see tomorrow if we can try day.

One more thing. We could not complete because Erika was at the arena and pressed ENTER to complete the WM? (I forgot the 3 letters) objective and at the same time as it explode, both of us crashed. We crashed at the same second which was a second after she pressed ENTER. Our dedi server was still running and did not reload the map.

crash.log

Sat Sep 24 19:15:58 2011

Crash in application version: 30899.3048

Unhandled exception - access violation

C STACK:

graw2 (???) : ???

Renderer: normal

Physics : threaded

[kaapo]

Today we have made the day version.

Frames with night or day are mostly the same. Could not see a difference, if there is one, it is small.

It remember me a long time ago when a mission rn smooth until a tank or helicopter came in. At this time the frames dropped to 16 and after the vehicle was down, the frames went up again. Now it's the complete mission like this. I know it's hard for you to see or re-produce because of your fast PC. This time we completed all objectives and left WMD as last one. When we walked into the arena I looked at both PCs fps values and I could see 18. After that I was hit by the heli and Erika moved into the fight with the last AIs. So I picked me the sniper to shot the heli and at the same time I shot a at it, Erika pressed ENTER to complete the mission. WMD accomplished and both of our clients was crashed at the same second again. Same crash.log as well. We used our dedi server PC playing local LAN only and 2 client PCs without any firewall or ant-virus........and without last year Windows-updates.

.....but the map and mission is very nice and make much fun.As alway we just tried the hard version which is not too hard and not to easy. A good thing is alway 2 vehicles coming at the same time from 2 different directions

All in all a great map/mission again!

[ebk52]

Hello John, I tested with the triplex and were both very happy we tested it this easy section we also agreed that there were many places we expected that there would be an ai which then was empty liked could Stopper an ai more into some empty spots on sniper when we got message that now there will be sniper I encountered not a single folder itself is well set up the way you put a map up on is very much in my taste, ve did not have eny problems whit lag lol ai did fight back i use not to play easy bot hardcore so I am excited to try it again on hardcore . =GE=ebk52 =GE=Ghostsoldiers Elite

Edited September 26, 2011 by JohnTC02
Removed quotes

[JohnTC02]

Hi All,

kaapo, I have no idea why you are having these lag problems as there is nothing different here to my other maps, all I can suggest is that the size of the mission script is much larger than the big maps that Bob makes, there are almost 2000 lines of code for this map, I think I'm right in saying that Bob's are around 800 lines.

Having all these new/extra features in my maps requires a lot of code to run them, having said that I don't see how this will effect the frame rate that much to bring it down to the levels you are seeing.

I will just mention that Sonia played this mission on her laptop and was getting a frame rate of 30-50 fps with only occasional lag.

As to the crash, looks to me like a normal graw2 bug but I have seen this when the PC is having problems coping with the amount of recourses required by the game.

Looking at your system specs I would suspect the amount of video ram on your machines, I'm not sure what your server is running but 512mb (client) is a bit low for the amount of effects in my missions compared to 1500mb on my primary video card and 512mb on my secondary, you need to remember that my maps do contain more effects when you complete some of the objectives.

ebk, pleased you liked the mission, you will find that the hard version has more AI and snipers so give this a try as I think it will suit you skill level much better.

Cheers,

John

[JackDoe]

I have the same problems as kaapo. Seems just a tad bit slow on the frame rates, but nowhere near the last map. This one is playable for me. I'm just playing locally on my PC (LAN) and it crashed on me the first time out on one of the objectives (not WMD). Tried it again tonight and went right instead of left and made it all the way to the WMD. Blowing that gave me the same error as kaapo. Maybe it is a problem just for those of us with lower amounts of video ram? I'm running 512 on the video card and about 2.8 gig of total ram. Like kaapo said, there were a lot of large maps that I can play just fine. But it must be the extra "intelligence" being programmed in that's causing ours to lag.

Crash in application version: 30899.3048

Unhandled exception - access violation

C STACK:

Graw2 (???) : ???

SCRIPT STACK:

data\lib\managers\eventmanager.dsf(0)

data\lib\managers\eventmanager.dsf(0)

data\lib\managers\worldmanager.dsf(0)

data\lib\managers\worldmanager.dsf(0)

data\lib\setups\setup.dsf(0)

data\level\level.dsf(0)

Renderer: normal

Physics : threaded

Edited September 28, 2011 by JackDoe

[kaapo]

John, could you please provide me with a map/mission name of one or two of your big ones (huge value of lines) you made last? May no last but one of the maps before your last 5 or 10? just to see if it really isn't my OS or drivers. It looks like I can compare with JackDoe as well. I'm wondering if I need a faster CPU or GPU....or both

[JohnTC02]

Hi kaapo,

Have a look at these, I have put the amount of code in brackets.

Operation Dualzone (2600 lines)

Operation Salazar (1460 lines but a big map with GR:AW1 buildings)

Los Mochis (1200 lines but the same landscape as Silver Dawn)

Operation Trident (3200 lines)

Operation Overload (2300 lines)

[kaapo]

Thank you John will try them on this weekend.

[JackDoe]

Okay, knowing Dualzone has more lines of code, I took a look at that map to refresh my memory. I never had any problems with that map. And the response time is excellent (no lag whatsoever). I jumped back into Silver Dawn and big-time lag. So it can't be the number of lines of code.

On a side note, I realized a commonality when I crashed. The first time was up in the tall tower which triggers the heli. The second time was the WMD which also triggers a heli. Both times I crashed, the heli was still alive and I detonated the C4 on the objective. I wonder if it would have crashed if I destroyed the heli first, waited a half minute or so and then blew up the objective? Don't have time to try that out now, but maybe kaapo can see if that makes a difference. I know he said they blew the heli at about the same time which might be the same as having the heli active.

Seems like two issues, but maybe they're related. If it's a problem with memory, then I can see the heli and blowing up the objective just overloading our older PCs. The only thing that throws a kink in this is that I don't have any problems with Dualzone. Why the response difference between the two? Something must be different.

Edited September 29, 2011 by JackDoe

[JohnTC02]

This is so frustrating, I don't see why Silver Dawn is giving Jack and kaapo all these lag problems when Jack can play Dualzone without any problems which is by comparison a much bigger map.

Looking at Dualzone I noticed that it uses the same landscape (mission 08) as Silver Dawn, also checking the textures these are almost identical.

So, we have identical landscapes, pretty much the same building sets using the similar textures, plus Silver Dawn has less script but is giving the two of you more lag, crazy!

I have compared the two maps:

Dualzone weapon loadout screen: 1230 fps.

Silver Dawn weapon loadout screen: 1180 fps.

In game using the hard version:

Dualzone gives an average of 90-160 fps.

Silver Dawn gives an average of 75-140 fps.

Even though Silver Dawn is giving me lower frame rates I don't get any lag in either mission.

The difference between these two maps is not enough to lead me to think that there is something wrong with Silver Dawn.

All I will say is that my newer missions do contain more complex objectives which will use more recourses but IMO not enough to cause the problems that kaapo and Rick are having.

So after all that we are back to square one, no solution!!

[RickDekkard]

All I will say is that my newer missions do contain more complex objectives which will use more recourses but IMO not enough to cause the problems that kaapo and Rick are having.

Hey John, I didn't have any problems at all with your last maps. I can play it smoothly without issues or crashes, apart the usual GRAW2 crashes, of course. I get FPS enough to share with kaapo if I will be able do that

Is strange that they can play other complex maps without trouble or lag, but seems they need some hardware upgrade. I experience no differences with the other maps, but my system is quite updated in hardware.

Regards, keep going mate.

[rahnman]

Hi John,

The TAW clan just finished testing this map on our dedicated server. No-one had any problems with lag. Everything went really smooth. I would suggest that you put some fencing up at the extraction building to protect the AI from getting sniped from the tower. Other than that it looks good to go.

Cheers,

Rahn

[JackDoe]

Yeah, I will say that our lag is not an issue with your maps when others don't have problems. It's just something we (or I) have to live with. Don't have the money to upgrade hardware even though it's needed (for other reasons). Such is life. Keep cranking them out!

Just for fun, I checked out my fps on both maps tonight.

Silver Dawn: 10-11 fps (constant between just those two)

Dualzone: 33-41 fps

Edited October 1, 2011 by JackDoe

[kaapo]

Yes, the performance is not a map issue, it's CPU issue. Today I'm alone but I could compare the maps as good as I can.

Fore some reason my E6750 was switched back to 2.67ghz and that's why I had almost the same fps on both PCs.

Now I got it on 2.92ghz for better CPU compare.

Here is my result of 5 min playing on 2 diff PCs (hard mode):

First value E4400@2,67Ghz / second value E6750@2,92

SilverDawn

Load screen (-after 1 minute) 33 (-58) / 33 (-105)

5min fps 25-15 (17) / 40-17 (20)

Load between 30 / 35

Respawn 20 / 23

Dualzone

Load screen (-after 1 minute) 205 (-205) / 515 (-515)

5min fps 95-48 (55) / 120-61 (74)

Load between 165 / 260

Respawn 95 / 120

Overlord

Load screen (-after 1 minute) 333-375 / 560-560

5min fps 144-52 (70) / 195-70 (85)

Load between 155 / 293

Respawn 103 / 144

Salazar

Load screen (-after 1 minute) 85-132 / 185-212

5min fps 33-23 (26) / 45-26 (32)

Load between 66 / 80

Respawn 33 / 47

Trident

Load screen (-after 1 minute) 28-35 / 30-57

5min fps 22-14 (17) / 26-19 (22)

Load between 29 / 35

Respawn 22 / 26

Dualzone was running 200% faster on both PCs

Overlord was running 250% faster

Salazar was running 60% faster

Trident was about the same as Silver Spawn

This means JackDoe and I need to have at least faster CPUs because it's true, the additional script lines need much more CPU.

Will test the GPU thing later. At least trying WMD with the faster PC but I think all others are right that our crashes is not a mission issue!

[JohnTC02]

Thanks Jack/kaapo,

I think that some of the crash issues you are having may be down to the amount of video ram on you computers, you both have 512mb which I don't think is enough to run the game and keep it stable, it might also be the cause of you lag rather that the CPU.

I will get this released when I can, I'm a bit bogged down with other things at the moment along with making another map/mission.

Cheers,

John

[kaapo]

I will be off for a while because I realized that beside 2 CPUs + 2 GPUs I need new motherboards as well as new memory. Kaapo

[Anthony]

John

Have been away from the forum for a long time but I did manage to try out Silver Dawn and I can report that I had no problems with the way the game played. I did not experience any of the problems reported by Kaapo and JackDoe. In fact everything I experienced says the mission is good to go. Played through in hardcore and had a hoot.

The damn vans that blow up in your face are a pain but other than that I got through the map OK and really enjoyed it.

Keep 'em coming.

Anthony

[ebk52]

Hi John I had no problems playing the map now lag, way to put a map up on is that you know exactly my style and do I test it for errors and can not find any so I can only say one litle more masterpiece in my eyes, and I'm so glad your back turned to graw2 and gave something dead back to life,, to take your good work John is a few who do not see the god work you do for Graw 2 =GE=ebk52 =GE=Ghostsoldiers Elite ::: PS:i hope you cant read it as you se my english is not the best.