Not that I have played any GR in a long time. I'll still offer my $0.02.
1) A mission should be achievable using multiple approaches. Those approaches should be reasonably balanced, so that the penalty (or reward) for making a choice does not make the mission too hard/easy.
In Claiming Liberty, it was pretty much straightforward: fire rockets at the tanks, kill all enemies BEFORE capturing the escaped officer, do NOT leave the ambush zone until the vehicles come, and destroying the depot BEFORE going to the fort because if you didn't you couldn't win the mission because the script was too restrictive. The game should be much more dynamic.
2) Choices/decisions should be clear. This impacts how you write the briefing and how you script the mission. Skip the rambling prose in the briefing and tell people what they need to do and how they are nominally supposed to do it. Any changes that come up in game should be clearly presented (no 20 line text box that is up for 2 seconds in the middle of a firefight). Better to use chat messages and adjust the objectives dynamically. Again, keep the choices balanced, this is not a puzzle game where you want people to try things until they guess how you scripted the "winning plan".
I never enjoyed objective changes, partly because it makes your scripts much more complicated, because if a player completes one objective somehow before it is available for completion, you'll enable the new obj blocks and it will not function.....just was too much for me.
3) Failure (and extraction) should always be an option. I hate missions that will not let you extract until you have done "everything," or missions that just fail because you ran out of AT weapons or demo charges. Give the players a chance to improvise, maybe they can recover/find a kit, maybe they just lose an objective, maybe they decide they are going to "run for the chopper" and escape with what they have left. This is another form of choice that the players should have and will improve their sense of immersion.
I was working on the TACT (tenth anniversary celebration tournament) for GR, but never finished it. I always had a blue zone marked on map that would let the players extract even without completing all objectives. Of course, it still deducted the 80 points as if they had failed, but they could still salvage part of the mission
4) Make the script a "living environment" for the players. Think about your script as running a high level commander/AI for all of the actors on the map, and make them react to the things the player does. For replayability using a bit of randomness to reactions and reaction timing can be a huge bonus. This forces players to watch what is happening around them and make decisions/choices rather than "ride on a rail" and shoot at the popup targets.
Very good description here. If I understand correctly, you're saying that you should have more scripted reactions. If you examine the first original campaign mission by RSE, you'll see they had some things like this; while not very complicated, it still added some realism, although I never noticed this happening in game until I perused thru the script. They have a runner for each outpost who will, when alerted, runs to either the caves or tent camp which will alert them. This is not actually realistic though in my case, since in 2017 we'll probably all have radio communication or something. But having reinforcements run over to a downed patrol makes so many possibilties: a diversion so the players can make it through a defended point stealthily, or many other things. Having a realistic environment with a reactive script opens so many more realistic options.
Dang, now I'm just itching to script a mission
I'll be glad when Zeko finishes the first map.
Edited by rileyfletcher_01, 29 December 2011 - 03:56 PM.
