Fan Mission: The Transaction by Sotha (2011/03/04)

[snobel]

Thanks for this mission, it was very enjoyable! I had the sword-and-blackjack-combo bug(?) too, but other than that everything went smoothly.

 

I had expected a surprise bonus zombie in that cellar at the end, but it turned out to be another surprise bonus...

 

 

Had to laugh here:

 

When I first entered the torture chamber the woman shouted "Please help me!" but I decided to clear out the place before letting her go. The second time I came in, carrying an unconscious builder, she went "hm-hm!" as if to say "Hey! Remember me? The damsel in distress?"

 

[lowenz]

First 7 minutes (vs guards )

 

 

 

NO FPS problem for me :|

 

A question:

 

Can't go here! http://darkfate.ru/f...s/screen006.jpg

Where's that place?

 

Up :|

Edited March 6, 2011 by lowenz

[Sotha]

Up :|

 

I did not understand your initial question.

I assume you do not find your way to the location?

 

 

 

Read more carefully grenefelds diary. All info is in there.

 

 

[Thiefette]

First off - Congrats Sotha. I loved, loved, loved this mission. It was exciting right from the start and that was on easy.

 

Finding a place to stash the bodies was a bit tricky at first as I didn't take out the one with the torch first. Once they were taken care of I went into the bookstore for another big surprise. Tried to run, got whacked so fought back and with one blow got the queen.

 

I loved how objectives kept getting added. I like a mission with surprises. Your use of the lightening really added to the thrill of finding a place to hide.

 

 

When I finished the first time I saw that I didn't have all the loot so went back in to look for the rest.

 

I kept thinking of the picture and portal so went back there and looked some more. After thouroghly searching the room (as a desparate measure and without saying too much here) I tried the "trigger" and laughed my butt off at the results until I turned and saw that that was exactly what I was suppose to do. Sneaky. The only down side of this mission was that there was so many places I wanted to check out. Maybe another time eh.

Anyways going to try this one on harder levels as soon as I get the chance.

[lowenz]

I did not understand your initial question.

I assume you do not find your way to the location?

 

 

 

Read more carefully grenefelds diary. All info is in there.

 

 

Found it! Thanks

[Chiron]

Thank you Sotha, I had a lot of fun with this.

I liked a lot about this FM:

 

 

 

The story telling, the town layout, the atmosphere,the readables, the locking mechanism

in the church, stuff like firewood, generators on roofs...

And I liked that you "forced" players to fight, but still made it easy enough, so you

can make it if you at least bother to try.

 

 

 

What I did not like:

 

 

That most of the town was inaccessible. The atmosphere is so good, but there just isn't enough to do in this town.

 

 

[Springheel]

Wow, I don't seem to be having much luck with this FM.

 

I'm still 2000 loot short and I have no idea where else to go. I know there must be other places I haven't seen, since I haven't found where the

wench I saw earlier came from, nor have I found any of the lengthy readables people have mentioned. The only places I've found that I can enter are the small builder chapel, the bookstore and an abandoned plague building that seemed to be completely empty.

I'm going to need some kind of hint.

[Bikerdude]

Hmm, Sotha, you know I'm a big fan, so don't take this the wrong way, but I think

Er springs, you can easily avoid the guard - I just ran over to the left hand corner of the courtyard and waited for the guard to carry on his way...

 

@ Sotha, dude... what were you thinking when you built that chapel! Next fm drop me a pm and I will whip you up a simple/basic chapel that will befit an tdm fm....

Edited March 7, 2011 by Bikerdude

[ungoliant]

 

wench I saw earlier came from

 

 

yes, I had forgotten about this. The first time i went in to the bookstore, a guard had followed me in and caused a ruckus. I sorted it out, and after the cutscene...

 

I was busy looting the place, and the wench from the church basement walked in patrolling, saw me and ran out screaming for guards. I never saw any other wench in the FM anywhere. only happened when the guard stormed the bookstore after me.

.

 

Im pretty sure i didn't miss any entire areas/houses as I only missed 300 loot, same as pranqster, so i assume we missed the exact same detail. Definitely not anywhere that someone could just walk in / out of at the very least. is this a bug?

[Springheel]

 

I was busy looting the place, and the wench from the church basement walked in patrolling, saw me and ran out screaming for guards

 

I never saw a church basement, so I guess that's one place I can go.

 

[prjames]

...

@swordbreaker:

 

The mission was designed evilly so that some time after the lich incident a customer arrives to the shop. (Murphy's Law). If the player has cleaned the shop room of all evidence of murder (weapons, bloodstains, bodies), the customer will just think the shopkeeper is away and leaves. If she spots something suspicious, she goes to fetch guards to solve the situation.

 

...

 

That suggested a way to "game the system"

 

 

I replayed the mission as follows: After doing and clearing the hammer area first, (which I did upon playing the mission the first time and realizing I'd have to fight a haunt with limited weaponry if I went to the bookstore first), I went to the bookstore. Before sitting in the chair, I used the lockpick to unlock the door to the 2nd floor, but didn't open the door. This doesn't fail the mission unless you open the door. I also used water arrows to turn off all lights in the room - which also doesn't fail the mission. Then, I sat in the chair and triggered Mr. Haunt and slew him with my sword. I quickly hauled the bookseller's body and dropped it on the 2nd floor staircase, water-arrowed the bloodstain, and hauled Mr. Haunt's sword up onto the 2nd floor staircase.

 

 

Here's the joker:

I waited and waited but the customer who was supposed to show up never did. I wonder if the scripts are set up such that the customer doesn't show up if she won't find anything - or if there's no light in the shop.

 

 

By the way, your

cranking up the guard's sensitivity and using the puddles as noise-generators, and lightning strikes as random light-generators, made it impossible for me to blackjack the guards.

I'm impressed with your level design given your goal - to make life challenging for the player.

 

Nice mission!

 

- prjames

Edited March 7, 2011 by prjames

[Sotha]

Here's the joker:

I waited and waited but the customer who was supposed to show up never did. I wonder if the scripts are set up such that the customer doesn't show up if she won't find anything - or if there's no light in the shop.

 

 

 

Nope, she will come. Most likely you didn't wait long enough. Also she might be slowed down if you left bodies in the streets, which makes her to search near the bodies.. In this case she is alerted and will get help to the shop anyways, so your house cleanup won't help.

 

Lights have nothing to do with it, she'll come shortly after the lich queens demise.

 

There is a long delay to give the player time to fool around in the store.

 

 

@ Sotha, dude... what were you thinking when you built that chapel! Next fm drop me a pm and I will whip you up a simple/basic chapel that will befit an tdm fm....

 

We just have different standards. I am perfectly happy with the chapel. It was supposed to be a a simple wooden chapel, as this is a poor town. It matches quite well with my vision, and resembles a lot of medieval wooden church I visited some time ago.

 

This is my building style and it will not change.

[Aprilsister]

The thing about gaming it... is that, yes, you can do that kind of stuff. But the mission briefing explicitly instructs or suggests that you don't want to intimidate the book-dealer. So, story-wise, you do not have your sword, or any other weapons for that matter, out when you go to sit down to talk to him. And, like-story-wise, you don't start shooting out lights and picking locks...

 

All of this "gaming" is, TBH, not good gaming.

 

I've always been a big proponent of Sotha's gameplay focus* and, as mentioned, his admirable ambition to keep expanding upon this aspect (and others). But this kind of story-telling is very ambitious and may need to be a little less so.

 

*I'm also a big fan of his visuals and think that it is a "myth" that he somehow doesn't achieve in that department... this mission looked great, very stylish overall, (excellent puddles! really! and that's just a for instance)

Edited March 7, 2011 by Aprilsister

[jaxa]

Looks great but I had some

 

 

 

problems getting out of the first room with guards coming in and out, hanging out by the doorway. First the lady came in, saw the blood I left by the door freaked out, got guards, who checked out the blood without noticing the body for a little while. Did some quicksaving and started hitting things with water arrows. When I took the blood out of the equation some guards noticed the body straight away. Eventually got frustrated, found the sword laying on the ground, picked it up and hit two guards repeatedly that I had trapped by moving the body and one of them got stuck (interesting visual cue, I think he got stuck on the body so he just light speed shifted further into the desk area, trapping him temporarily. Took 44 screenshots as I did this, yet to finish the mission.

 

I was able to deny the JAXA space agency of their custom flickr URL: http://www.flickr.com/photos/jaxa/

 

I think everyone here should get a Flickr account and just dump screenshots in it after hitting F12 manically during gameplay. It appears to have a 300 MB monthly allowance. You can batch convert the .TGA files to .JPG in Irfanview (win) with dynamic naming in seconds.

 

I hope there are more AI improvements down the line, saw a lot of circling, and up to 4 guards bumbling around.

 

 

Edited March 7, 2011 by jaxa

[Trickster]

Thanks, Sotha ! Pure goodness to me. Voted excellent across the board.

 

 

I liked everything,being forced to fight (not an issue for me, i take classic FPS approach, moving quick and clicking attack like mad :-)) cause i like surprises, i like that chapel too, sure it works as is, lightning and rain was great, many guards with a torch was nice challenge, and ending was surprising too, though i expected zombies too :-) Your locking mechanism get bigger since Knighton Manor (one wheel more ?) which made me a hard time to solve... overall, pretty challenging but never getting stuck... that´s just why i like your style. Just to say so along with Melan, more rooftops please :-)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Outlooker]

Another masterpiece.

 

A certain older bitch was no issue because I am generally suspicious and loaded up on wetting equipment and scouted the area around the book shop before I dared to enter, so Lady Unfriendly got an instant water cure *phew*.

But I was certainly shocked, didn't expect that old problem to ... revisit.

 

Guards were really numerous and difficult in places, but I liked that, keeps one on edge. Better than them being useless soon-to-sleep sword supports.

 

Story: brilliant. That kind of thing motivates so much more than just good looks.

 

Sidenote:

By doing that

I felt an unusual joy. Tempted to duplicate such behavior IRL , but afraid I lack the skill.

Will compensate by stealing choc now.

 

Thanks for two very pleasant hours.

Edited March 7, 2011 by Outlooker

[AluminumHaste]

Good fun, I had lots of fun. Haven't finished the mission yet though. Some screens.

 

[Carnage]

 

 

 

I never saw a church basement, so I guess that's one place I can go.

 

 

I reckon you already found it Spring?

 

 

if not there's a key in the side room in the chapel, which unlocks a lock on the pulpit, which you can then trigger to open a wall

 

[Professor Paul1290]

I really like how the lighting and the puddles affect how you sneak around in the streets here.

 

 

I also liked the fight with the Lich. However, it didn't occur to me to use the sword since it didn't work so well against similar looking enemies in the previous mission. I ended up running around a bit before finally using a fire arrow.

 

I thought the customer walking in afterwards was a nice touch. I actually brought the store owner upstairs to place him in his bed and didn't notice her until I came back down. Yay for normally useless habits being helpful for once!

 

I thought the loot might have been a bit to concentrated in the small church, but the other hand it does make sense that the loot would be there. I suppose with the current trend in other FMs, by now a lot of TDM players automatically read Builder symbols as big "ROB ME!" signs.

 

 

[Berny]

my opinion: don't change the fact that a client is coming, but insert an audio file of the player: "Maybe I should clean up this mess until the next client comes"

 

This would help a lot!

 

 

[Ladro]

As always I like a lot Sotha's Missions!

 

This little one, it's really brillant and original. The animations on game, are really a plus on the story.

 

The best place i like is:

 

 

The plague/abandoned area. So beautiful and tense. And it's cool to get some sleep there ;-)

 

 

The only think that i don't like is that a lot o area/doors are fake/closed, but i understand that it's really difficult to finish in a human time a big city map with all details, so it's cool to have a mission also with some area only *suggested*.

 

Bravo Sotha, I expect other so brillant FM from you!

[Berny]

Yeah, that would be cool - a bit more to discover! But that's peanuts in such a great mission

 

 

[XStationCube]

Er springs, you can easily avoid the guard - I just ran over to the left hand corner of the courtyard and waited for the guard to carry on his way...

 

@ Sotha, dude... what were you thinking when you built that chapel! Next fm drop me a pm and I will whip you up a simple/basic chapel that will befit an tdm fm....

 

I love your FMs, but what the hell? God knows we need 10,000 boring "proper" churches instead of promoting creativity, right? Personally I loved the church; the podium unlocking the secret passage was great, and the fully-voiced secret objective in the basement was a nice touch.

 

Also I don't really see the problem with the Revenant, but that's probably just because I walked past the bookstore on my first run through the city, and went to the Builder's chapel first instead because of how the pre-mission text made it pretty obvious that the player would need holy water for something ("Why else would there be a whole optional objective just to get some?").

 

Overall, I think this might be my favorite FM to be released since The Illusionist.

[nbohr1more]

LOL.

 

Just as easily, Sotha will "comment" on the gameplay of Biker's missions.

 

I dare say that it's just a little friendly rivalry, that's all.

 

You cant go wrong with these two greats mapping for the mod.

 

(I really hope Sotha gets a chance to resume soon though )

Edited March 9, 2011 by nbohr1more

[Sotha]

LOL.

Just as easily, Sotha will "comment" on the gameplay of Biker's missions.

I dare say that it's just a little friendly rivalry, that's all.

 

Aye, that it is. Or maybe it is not even rivalry, just the way of two people seeing things differently because of their personal preferences.

 

For the record, I have great appreciation for Biker's work. His emphasis seems to be lifelike portrayal of locations and that works quite well, but sometimes with the expense of gameplay. My own emphasis is in the story and gameplay; the location is just something I must create for the story/gameplay experience and I've little interest to create photo realistic scenes.

 

It is really nice have a multiple types of authors who produce different kinds of missions. And I admit I've been monitoring other mappers work and screenies and learning new techniques. This map, for example, has new kind of patchwork I have not used in my other maps. They have not been noticed explicitly in the players' comments, but I think they help make the scenes seem a bit more organic and realistic.