Fan Mission: The Lieutenant 2: High Expectations by Frost_Salamander (2023/04/24)

[manzanita-crow]

@frost_salamander I entered

Spoiler

through the warehouse from the riverside

 

[Frost_Salamander]

1 hour ago, manzanita-crow said:

@frost_salamander I entered

  Reveal hidden contents

through the warehouse from the riverside

 

ok thanks, yeah there is no reason that shouldn't have worked.

I've created a new version and sent it off to @irisx and @DavyJones to see if it helped with the Linux crash (I also fixed the missing material warning).  If anyone else wants to try it it's here (version 1.1): https://drive.proton.me/urls/K90XY99T8C#knRJbEEliX18

Ideally I'd get the crash sorted before I publish an update, but I'd be surprised if this fixes it.

[irisx]

OK, posting this in case anybody else is having the 1.5 second crash I was experiencing in Linux: if I quicksave immediately on mission start, before the message about reading the objectives appears, then I am able to continue normally, quickload normally etc.

So DavyJones is probably right, it seems to be caused by something happening during- or right after that message appears.

[Frost_Salamander]

I've moved the crash discussion to its own thread here: 

 

[tapewolf]

Just finished the mission.  It was amazing and I did not suffer the crashing bug under Linux which others have reported.  However there are a couple of loose ends (that I know of):
 

Spoiler

I accidentally found Mr. C in the church while investigating an open window.  However I never found the message suggesting he might be going there, unless it's supposed to be implied from the letter to Mr. S and the various shenanigans involving Brother G.

I was never able to solve the Atkinson mystery.  At first I was afraid that by finding the body prematurely I'd upset matters, but scanning through other posts here, it looks like I need to find an incriminating letter but the map is so vast I may never find it without some kind of hint, narrowing it down to a building would help!  I have, however, found the letter sent to Burns in Mr. C's mansion, a letter from Burns in room 21 of the hotel, and Burns' journal.

On that topic, the letter in room 21 is addressed to Johan (the ex-employee of Troutbeck from the previous mission?) while the other letters seem to be discussing 'Jonas'.  Is this a mistake or a misdirection (i.e. that both of them wrote to Burns)?

Also, is there any way to deal with the Ella situation, e.g. dropping Mr. S' incriminating letter in room 43 for the detective?  That doesn't sound like it would fly without proof that the Captain is compromised, and I've not found that apart from the fact that he was by the pool in Mr. C's mansion.

Oh - one other thing.  There was a house belonging to the Hodgesons which is roughly between the Safe House and Mr.C's place.  Inside it, exciting music plays which had me tearing the place apart looking for evidence of treason or something major, but it just seems to have a small amount of loot in an unpickable chest.  Is there something I'm missing or just an unusual choice of music cue for that building?

All in all it was fantastic and I'm amazed that all this fit into a 34MB file, even with compression.

[Frost_Salamander]

28 minutes ago, tapewolf said:

Just finished the mission.  It was amazing and I did not suffer the crashing bug under Linux which others have reported.  However there are a couple of loose ends (that I know of):
 

  Reveal hidden contents

I accidentally found Mr. C in the church while investigating an open window.  However I never found the message suggesting he might be going there, unless it's supposed to be implied from the letter to Mr. S and the various shenanigans involving Brother G.

I was never able to solve the Atkinson mystery.  At first I was afraid that by finding the body prematurely I'd upset matters, but scanning through other posts here, it looks like I need to find an incriminating letter but the map is so vast I may never find it without some kind of hint, narrowing it down to a building would help!  I have, however, found the letter sent to Burns in Mr. C's mansion, a letter from Burns in room 21 of the hotel, and Burns' journal.

On that topic, the letter in room 21 is addressed to Johan (the ex-employee of Troutbeck from the previous mission?) while the other letters seem to be discussing 'Jonas'.  Is this a mistake or a misdirection (i.e. that both of them wrote to Burns)?

Also, is there any way to deal with the Ella situation, e.g. dropping Mr. S' incriminating letter in room 43 for the detective?  That doesn't sound like it would fly without proof that the Captain is compromised, and I've not found that apart from the fact that he was by the pool in Mr. C's mansion.

Oh - one other thing.  There was a house belonging to the Hodgesons which is roughly between the Safe House and Mr.C's place.  Inside it, exciting music plays which had me tearing the place apart looking for evidence of treason or something major, but it just seems to have a small amount of loot in an unpickable chest.  Is there something I'm missing or just an unusual choice of music cue for that building?

 

All in all it was fantastic and I'm amazed that all this fit into a 34MB file, even with compression.

HI @tapewolf thanks for playing and glad you enjoyed it!

Regarding the target location:

Spoiler

The possible locations of Coates are described in the briefing.  If he appeared in the church, that means you visited the hotel first - is that correct?

To solve the Atkinson objective, you need to (spoiler):

Spoiler

• find Atkinson himself
• find and read a letter from Burns to Atkinson in the hotel room 21
• find and read a note from Atkinson in the The Hammer pub
• find and read Burns' journal
• find and read the first letter from Atkinson to Burns in the mansion
• find and read the letter from Coates to Sharpe in Sharpe's office in the mansion
• find and read the letter from the Mayor to Commander Bryant in the Watch Station

It may seem like a lot of stuff, but the objective is optional and you need all the pieces of the puzzle to get the whole story.

After you do that, you will get another task that will help address the Ella situation

The Hodgson house - that is mostly just as a thoroughfare:
 

Spoiler

You can get into the mansion from one of the windows.  Not sure what music you are talking about - you mean the ambient within the house?  Maybe it was a bad choice lol I'll have a look. Also the chest has a key somewhere in that room, you just need to look for it!

The Johan/Jonas thing - sounds like a typo I will have a look at put in a fix for the next version.

[tapewolf]

14 minutes ago, Frost_Salamander said:

HI @tapewolf thanks for playing and glad you enjoyed it!

The Hodgson house - that is mostly just as a thoroughfare:
 

Yeah, the Hodgson house was playing some unexpectedly dynamic ambient music each time I entered it.  It's pretty good actually, it was just not what I was expecting to hear for a random house.

If I have time I can record a clip or search through the ambient music library in Darkmod's resources to work out which one it is, but I won't be able to do that tonight.

Thanks for the hints (and the mission too, of course).

Edited May 2, 2023 by tapewolf

[Xolvix]

It occurred to me that if TDM was a commercial triple-A game, there would be a HUD waypoint you could follow that would lead directly to all the evidence needed for the Atkinson objective. It'd be so incredibly easy... but at the same time feel rather hollow. At least here if I couldn't complete the objective, it would motivate me to seek it out on a future replay - something to look forward to doing better next time. But a lot of people don't replay games (if they finish them at all) and publishers hate negative comments people give about missing out on content, but it's how the industry is I guess.

Not really sure what the point of this observation is apart from perhaps noting how refreshingly old-school TDM is. It's niche, but it serves a niche that most publishers would never touch.

Edited May 3, 2023 by Xolvix

[Frost_Salamander]

8 hours ago, tapewolf said:

Yeah, the Hodgson house was playing some unexpectedly dynamic ambient music each time I entered it.  It's pretty good actually, it was just not what I was expecting to hear for a random house.

If I have time I can record a clip or search through the ambient music library in Darkmod's resources to work out which one it is, but I won't be able to do that tonight.

Thanks for the hints (and the mission too, of course).

It's OK I'll have a look myself - I'm intrigued now 

[Kopfrkingl]

Nice! I have enjoyed your previous missions a lot and this one certainly did not disappoint. The story had me hooked from the start and I greatly enjoyed finding new readables and piecing together what happened. Assassination missions are not that common in TDM, so I just had to replay the mission and see how things play out if the target appears in different locations. During my first playthrough, I tossed him down the hotel toilets, and in my second I sniped him from the church rafters. Really neat - and the sheer amount of places to explore really adds to the replayability, too. The map is fun to navigate, with plenty of verticality, and looks good, so it's definitely one I will return to from time to time.

[tapewolf]

11 hours ago, Frost_Salamander said:

It's OK I'll have a look myself - I'm intrigued now 

Listening to it again, it starts out fairly similar to other ambient music tracks, but then it adds a pulsing synth track, and eventually drums and guitars kick in.  So maybe it's just that I lingered in the house longer than anyone else for some reason.

 

As for the hints:

Spoiler

Thanks, the pub and the Watch were locations I could see on the map, but assumed didn't exist because I couldn't find an entrance.  And this was after doing a lot of climbing around the balconies while exploring Lady Everly square. Burns is going to have a nasty surprise when he wakes up.

With the church as a location, I may have read it in the briefing but forgot about it by the time it became relevant since I was playing it for most of a week.  Since there were several notes left by Mr. C saying that he may or may not be at such-and-such a place, I assumed I was missing one somewhere.

Thanks again!

[Frost_Salamander]

20 minutes ago, tapewolf said:

Listening to it again, it starts out fairly similar to other ambient music tracks, but then it adds a pulsing synth track, and eventually drums and guitars kick in.  So maybe it's just that I lingered in the house longer than anyone else for some reason.

Possibly maybe longer than even I did by the sounds of it . I'm going to check it out now, it does sound like it would be a bit out of place.

EDIT: yep, definitely a poor choice on my part.  It will get changed in the next update.

Out of curiosity:

Spoiler

Did you get the objective to deal with Sharpe as well?

 

Edited May 3, 2023 by Frost_Salamander

[tapewolf]

12 minutes ago, Frost_Salamander said:

Possibly maybe longer than even I did by the sounds of it . I'm going to check it out now, it does sound like it would be a bit out of place.

Out of curiosity:

  Hide contents

Did you get the objective to deal with Sharpe as well?

 

Spoiler

Yes thanks, I managed to discover the Sharpe quest on my own.

 

[JiriH]

Player stuck at an end-game objective asks for help:

Spoiler

I got "Well done. Now check in at Lennard's safe house." objective.
I use roofs to drop down on pipe in a small shaft, then traverse the house and meet Lennard. What should I do to advance in the objective?
I tried running arround, frobbing everything, looking for hidden switches,...
(I know it is Lennard, because when nothing worked, I knocked him out and lifted the body to check who he is:).

Probably I'm missing something obvious.
Thank you!

PS: Awesome mission - levels like these are a game of their own!

[Frost_Salamander]

1 minute ago, JiriH said:

Player stuck at an end-game objective asks for help:

  Hide contents

I got "Well done. Now check in at Lennard's safe house." objective.
I use roofs to drop down on pipe in a small shaft, then traverse the house and meet Lennard. What should I do to advance in the objective?
I tried running arround, frobbing everything, looking for hidden switches,...
(I know it is Lennard, because when nothing worked, I knocked him out and lifted the body to check who he is:).

Probably I'm missing something obvious.
Thank you!

PS: Awesome mission - levels like these are a game of their own!

In the upstairs room in the safe house there is a letter and a key on the desk. You just need to read the letter.

[JiriH]

Possible bug: Guard patrolling

Spoiler

the green-glowing pool

(heavy helmet, cannot be knocked-out) carries a golden key. I was not able to steal it from him. I tried notarget+noclip to check if it is just a question of wrong boundary (?) - or my inability as a player - but was not successful either.

[Frost_Salamander]

9 minutes ago, JiriH said:

Possible bug: Guard patrolling

  Reveal hidden contents

the green-glowing pool

(heavy helmet, cannot be knocked-out) carries a golden key. I was not able to steal it from him. I tried notarget+noclip to check if it is just a question of wrong boundary (?) - or my inability as a player - but was not successful either.

Yes we saw that in beta and couldn't get to the bottom of it. I could never reproduce it myself. As a result, the doors the key opens are also pickable.

[gokudo]

Had high expectations and I wasn't disappointed! Looking forward to the next instalment of Hare in the Snare btw!

[Frost_Salamander]

Version 1.1 is ready: 

Proton Drive: https://drive.proton.me/urls/6E6GRW28EM#Kbv446IaKHe6

Github: https://github.com/FrostSalamander/fsx/releases/download/1.1/highex.pk4

This should fix the 2 biggest issues:

• target not spawning
• crash near start of map on Linux (but was also happening on Windows, just much less often)

Full changelog here: https://github.com/FrostSalamander/fsx/releases/tag/1.1

@nbohr1more could we get this updated in the mission database please? 

[nbohr1more]

Thank you again! The update has been applied to the mission database.

 

[manzanita-crow]

Hi there, I tried again and this time

Spoiler

Vinton Coates spawned in the Church (I went into hotel first, the same way).

The only objective (that I know of) that I haven't achieved is

Spoiler

the loot objective

Spoiler

Objectives I have done:

• I killed Vinton
• I checked in at safe house
• I've freed Jimmy Cook
• framed the Cooks
• I found out what happened to Atkinson
• I've put Burns on the bed in the hotel room
• I drowned Sharp

 

The one thing I know I haven't done is

Spoiler

get in the hotel safe. I looked all over Sharp's room for a code, but maybe I'm being blind

Any hints please?

[Frost_Salamander]

@manzanita-crow

hint:

Spoiler

search the hotel penthouse suite thoroughly

 

[manzanita-crow]

Thanks, I've found out I also haven't

Spoiler

been in a locked room at the top of the prison.

Hints for that also welcome. Just a rough idea is good ta

[Frost_Salamander]

Just now, manzanita-crow said:

Thanks, I've found out I also haven't

  Hide contents

been in a locked room at the top of the prison.

Hints for that also welcome. Just a rough idea is good ta

hint:

Spoiler

if it's what I think it is, that door is only openable from the other side.  You need to get into that room another way

 

[mango777]

Absolute beauty Frost_Salamander!! Well done on making such a superb level!! The standard was so high I cannot possibly find fault with it. I never found the code for the safe in the hotel though - where did you ferret that away you sly old fox? 

 

Again - beautiful work!!!!!!!!!!!!