Please leave feed back, stories or videos about the event here!
Sorry for the plane issues in the start.
Incredibly enjoyable mission on my part. It was a challenging, yet very fun mission. The intensity of many of the firefights was a thrill for me at least. Also the stand I did with red team was the best part for me, as it forced me to completely immerse myself in the experience, which made it so much more fun for me.
Wow is there a lot to unpack about tonight’s mission. First off Technical issues. Old scope box used, wrong camo on friendly units, the 2 plane crashes that could have been easily avoidable, severe FPS issues around the club. All things that I feel could have been avoided, mitigated or at the very least picked up on in a mission review. If mission review doesn’t catch this sort of thing then why do we do it?
There also seemed to be little thought put into how we’d escort the DJ once we had him, poor Henrick followed by Mathusse had to escort him around effectively making their gameplay a walking simulator for the duration he survived. While I appreciate it wouldn’t have been possible to RC for the entire duration of the 2nd half of the op there were other options. Zeus issuing movement commands or attach as AI to a squad come to mind straight away.
I’d also like to note that I’m very unhappy with Shiny’s comments at the end of the mission calling out Baegel for disconnecting mid way through the mission, a mission that broken (to start with at least) wasn’t fun and I think Baegel was well within his rights to not want to continue, the rule I always heard was that if you aren’t having fun then just disconnect and while I do appreciate this makes things very awkward if this is a PLT Lead that decides to do this are we seriously saying a person should have to continue leading a mission they aren’t enjoying for the rest of the evening?
Last thing I’d like to cover was the decision to leave Red behind. As with anything this is my opinion and probably somewhat coloured by what info I had access to but this is my take. Red were given multiple orders to fall back asap, with it seeming to start with just a single person down that could have been carried out if the order had been followed then. Order was then given to actively abandon surviving but down members of Red. Wasn’t an easy choice to make but I fully support Ionaru in his decision. Better to save some lives than to have everyone die trying to make sure everyone makes it out. Its shitty I know but this isn’t a 90’s American War Movie, we don’t have any motto of "no man left behind" and in that situation leaving people behind was the right choice. Yellow/Lead were a good 200m away and behind heavy tree cover so not in a position to easily support Red’s withdrawal and to go back to save you would have ended in our death too.
Mission did somewhat redeem itself in the 2nd half and escaping through the jungle under heavy fire was quite fun, just wish it had happened in and op that didn’t have all these other issues
I’d like to address that my game absolutely froze, crashed, and overheated my PC. The server would not let me reconnect.
It was a cool concept, cool atmosphere but holy shit.
All the technical issues aside, Tanoa jungle at night with low frames + nvgs is NOT fun imo. If this was located in the city or something it would have been much better in my opinion.
Regarding red teams situation, if we moved Aether and Killerbyte, they would have died. Especially Aether was unable to be moved, as he had 15+ wounds, plus of course no heart rate. Lead and yellow were really close at one point, and were in a position to help, as CNTR shows. I understand the decision made by Lead, however they could have helped when they first returned. CNTR
Did it actually overheat your PC?
PC got extremely hot after I got arma’d in the dance club cave and then it crashed my game. So it was close, probably
Will break this down one by one.
Old scope box. Yes, mission was made in november. I did update the compositions but apparently forgot to place the new scope box.
Wrong camo. I thought this was the right one and it looked better then the other available ones in the Tanoa jungle when fighting on hills/declines where the enemy would look at us from an angle (below or above) let alone the amount of camo this gives you when you are laying on the ground. Then intention of the entire mission was also to never (or keep it to a minimum) to leave the jungle. Of course as soon as you hit a big open green field the other one would have made more sense. No arguing there. Not a mistake, intentional. Look at these 2 screenshots. Yes I could have gone for the other one. I just felt this made sense with the brownish/muddish and more fitting ground rather then anything else. Therefor I feel wrong is an overstatement. In my eyes this made the most sense in the setting I was going with.
(don’t want to include images since this is already fucking long)
2 plane crashes could maybe have been avoided, if! I knew players added weight and that affected the plane. I did not however. I also did not anticipate the winds due to the new mods to be this heavy. Can I say I dislike this and would like the ability to turn them off. I already did in the monthly meeting where we made the choice but by god I really dislike this.
Severe FPS issues. The verdict is out for this one, but as many stated even though there was an FPS drop, it is impossible to determine the cause. You can jump in the mission alone and take a look. Or even with multiple people. Tell me if your FPS drops significantly. Mine did not. Also weirdly enough, halfway through the section of the club, as was stated in the debrief by multiple people, the FPS got better. Can we blame the club which was 20 static assets? Maybe. Can we blame another thing which I will get to later on in this topic. More likely. Read about it below under the Battle Eye topic.
Then to get to your mission review point. Which topics would really be solved by this. Topic 1 and maybe 3. I can name 2 others that would definitely have been resolved: no OPORD, wrong Squad names.
I would have probably noticed these too if I did not build the cave and spend most of the focus on that. But you know how it is when making missions, sometimes you just get tunnel vissioned on your vision.
Can you guess if this mission was reviewed either time this was planned to be run (November and now)?
[quote user_id=“13011722” avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/13011722/avatar/medium.1671107493.jpeg” name=“Quantum”]
There also seemed to be little thought put into how we’d escort the DJ once we had him, poor Henrick followed by Mathusse had to escort him around effectively making their gameplay a walking simulator for the duration he survived. While I appreciate it wouldn’t have been possible to RC for the entire duration of the 2nd half of the op there were other options. Zeus issuing movement commands or attach as AI to a squad come to mind straight away. [/quote]
This was entirely planned that you would do one of the following.
A, grab one of the vehicles and go undercover. I did not send multiple vehicles at you for no reason.
B, Carry him like you did and put him in safe locations. Now B might be a bad idea you say, however read back to the OPORD. "Avoid the main roads and do not get spotted by locals or guerrilla! " I fully intended as stated that we would avoid main roads and fights. Instead what we did was run into multiple townships and cross multiple roads. Carrying an NPC under fighting circumstances is not well suited. Placing him behind a tree could have been avoided.
AI orders for a civy do not work unfortunately as the civy goes into "panic state" as soon as a bullets impact near him, either causing A: civy starts running uncontrolably. B: Civy ducks and holds his hands to his heads and no longer moves.
Anyone will see that maybe in a mission where you use civies. I Hope anyone can learn from this feedback 
[quote user_id=“13011722” avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/13011722/avatar/medium.1671107493.jpeg” name=“Quantum”]
I’d also like to note that I’m very unhappy with Shiny’s comments at the end of the mission calling out Baegel for disconnecting mid way through the mission, a mission that broken (to start with at least) wasn’t fun and I think Baegel was well within his rights to not want to continue, the rule I always heard was that if you aren’t having fun then just disconnect and while I do appreciate this makes things very awkward if this is a PLT Lead that decides to do this are we seriously saying a person should have to continue leading a mission they aren’t enjoying for the rest of the evening? [/quote]
Mission was never broken. Yes we did crash a plane. But can you blame the mission for people not being able to connect to the server? No, Again I will get to that below under the Battle Eye header.
Basically people are within their rights to disconnect. However, it is common etiquette that when you are in a leadership position that people are depending on you. We also have rule 9 within our community rules ( https://www.carpenoctem.co/rules ) which state the following: "When selecting an important role during an operation, such as Squad Leader, Platoon Leader or medic, you should do so under the assumption you will be able to attend from the start of the operation until the debrief is completed".
I have the full believe it was every leaders intention to stay until the end. However, I may have over reacted when I said that. This is due to a few things. First, the server logs don’t show any reconnect attempt. If a computer overheats I can understand you let it cool down and try again or turn it off to cool it down. Then the second thing, immediately when he send me the message he was not getting in again. He started a different game. I have had my fair share of overheating in the past and I do believe any graphical intense game will crash your pc again if it just overheated. Not saying I don’t believe him, just saying that in the moment with all the facts on my table, it did not feel like he had any intention of rejoining. Therefor I expressed that I am saddened by this as PTL is the single most important role if we have multiple elements and a plan on the table.
Now there is another thing which I did not know and I will get to that again in the Battle Eye topic below. It’s the not being able to connect. However at this point in the mission we did have several successful connects already and someone else managed to get in 1.5 minutes after.
Server logs:
21:51:19 > Player Baegel disconnected
21:52:48 > Hateborder uses modified data file
21:52:48 > Player Hateborder connecting
21:53:52 > Player Hateborder connected
21:54:39 > Clarke uses modified data file
21:54:39 > Player Clarke connecting
21:55:41 > Player Clarke connected
23:04:27 > Player sheep kicked off, Steam ticket check failed: Steam authentication failed.
23:04:27 > Player sheep disconnected
23:06:15 > sheep uses modified data file
23:06:15 > Player sheep connecting
23:06:16 > Player sheep connected
23:18:19 > Player Mattdogs disconnected
Battle Eye:
Oh my battle eye. We have fought long and hard to get it disabled. And now it is disabled and Sagu did not crash. Great succes.
However, this has brought other things that we did not anticipate.
-
Desync. According to our inhouse experts, battle eye does not only detect people hacking. It also stabilizes desync. How? It kicks people if their ping spikes, if they have a lot of desync, if their steam authentication fails, in short you name it. I can not find a source in this except for the Server.CFG which I will explain further on.
-
What does desync do and why do I think it caused all these issues tonight (I may be wrong).
Desync is basically if something happens on your screen but it doesn’t on others. You may see something that is not there or might be in a different location.
What is the proof we saw this tonight.
A. Sheep was unconscious/dead on my screen near the rock wall. He was standing up and walking on his screen and some others. He was unconscious for some but they could not interact with him. I believe for Quantum he was in a different location then for me. In short, desync.
B. As you can see on discord, screenshots are posted of a huge pile of bodies in base. This was not there for others.
C. Teleporting players took seconds it should not do and for Sheep even 3 to 7 minutes. -
unexpected FPS issues due to the game trying to fix this desync.
The game was heavily trying to catch everyone up to current events. Where is the proof of that you may ask. Frankly I don’t have any screenshots. However let me put it in numbers that I saw and maybe we can have on a report if we ask the RnD team.
Server CPU during these fps issues: 41% CPU utilized. Memory 39% utilized.
Server state with 4 players: 1% CPU utilized. Memory 33% utilized. (screenshot in discord RnD)
The server was not capped out I believe but it was definitely struggling to get everyone up to speed. Magically this was resolved when I told Sheep to respawn after we had major discrepancies in what different members were seeing.
It can also be the mix of NVG, Tanoa and other things. Of course. -
People not being able to connect.
I believe, and this again was spoken about on TS after by several members that they agree, that people could not connect because our server was struggling with heavy desync/high ping. Even though joining has been taking longer and longer, not being able to connect at all has never happened. Or has it. Think back of when the server was down a week ago and last year. We had the exact same issue. People were only able to join on the mission select screen. Coincidence?
I don’t think so. My local server did not have Battle Eye enabled, or any of these settings I will name in point 5. This whole situation reminded me of that. Is this the actual reason, not sure. But I do believe this has to do with it and we might see it again next Tuesday. -
So why did all of this happen and why didn’t the server intervene???
During our Staff meeting we said we will not put in place any counter measures to limit the testing to just disabling Battle Eye so we can see if this fixes our issues. Rather then also changing the max desync, max ping and the auto kick. We did not want one of these possible settings to still kick Sagu and others and then be unsure what caused that.
Frankly, our server did not intervene because in the config it is not told to intervene.
Here is the link to the explanation: Arma 3: Server Config File - Bohemia Interactive Community
Here is our server config minus some info I can’t show like the password.
https://i.imgur.com/9qBHOpS.png
As you can see, we don’t have the maxdesync or maxping or maxpacketloss in the config at all! So it doesn’t kick. It tries to correct. Our auto kick is even set to 0 so it will never ever auto kick! There are some defaults I think by ArmA but they are freaking high or close to unlimited.
The results of this ( I do want to run another test event so prepare yourselves for possibly another bad OP this Tuesday [user avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/13011722/avatar/small.1671107493.jpeg” name=“Quantum”]13011722[/user] And it’s yours! ) is not 100%. But we did agree in TS this was very likely to be the case to todays issues. Also if this happens on Tuesday, no worries, I think I just cleared you of people calling your mission bad or having horrible fps issues which could have been avoided even though they probably could not
I hope this explained it a bit. I am not saying my mission was good or bad. I’ll let you guys be the judge of it. All I am asking before posting things is to check with the GM or others, and stick around for the full debrief to get the full story. As a lot of this was explained in the debrief/TS after talk. I did notice you left early Quantum, so you couldn’t have known. 4 minutes before we started talking about it 
PS also remember that after every update/tweak to the server or modpack issues like these can arise. Try to take that in consideration before calling a mission bad or telling someone they did a bad job.
PPS. I am not posting this to hurt anyones feelings. I am expressing my opinion as tonights GM, RnD member and player. This is not posted to attack anyone. I am merely stating what me as well as others have concluded in our talks after the mission. This is not posted from a Staff Sergeant Perspective and feel free to come back with why I am wrong. I will gladly take any criticism and will engage in a voice channel if you want to help out the upcoming testing, want to try the mission again with me in our own time, or anything else that can help us pinpoint if my findings above are right.
23:18:19 > Player Mattdogs disconnected
23:20:32 > PTS
23:21:17 > please give me a heal shiny.
23:21:21 > Same
23:21:48 > pts
23:24:03 > pts
23:24:14 > pts
23:24:42 > what does pts mean
23:24:46 > permission to speak
23:24:55 > we go down the PTS list at the end
23:24:56 > if you want to leave your own comment after everyone’s done, write pts
23:24:58 > We type that in global after and before missions so we can take turns talking
23:25:08 > pts
23:25:13 > can i get a heal
23:25:21 > +1
23:25:33 > +2
23:26:10 > forgot to say it, but from my perspective red team did a great job, at least internally. You too sheep, your AT was on point, and Mathusse ofcourse!
23:26:22 > <3
23:26:29 > i am forgotten ;_;
23:26:46 > you were in the team xD, but yes you did a good job too 
23:26:48 > still going through leads first
23:28:02 > sorry for my poor performence on Bravo lead, i’ll get better
23:28:08 > couple of issues* double plane crash 
23:28:31 > it could be AI pathfinding, it got better after we killed em
23:28:45 > nvm then
23:29:32 > the route was influenced because visibility and fps issues. NVGs and tanoa is a very risky mix.
23:29:36 > i remember after the 22:00 respawn saying "I’d rather fight 3 BTR’s than go into the jungle again"
23:29:41 > little did i know i’d get my wish
23:29:56 >
23:29:57 > Koffer your fault
23:30:28 > was that the rocket I fired?
23:31:31 > pts
23:32:08 > Player Quantum disconnected <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
23:33:31 > matts gone
23:33:36 > oh, different matt
23:34:21 > In general I do like your leading style Ionaru, hope you keep doing it
23:34:28 > +1
23:34:32 > +2
23:36:17 > What’s everyones FPS right now?
23:36:22 > 70
23:36:25 > 97
23:36:30 > 40
23:36:32 > 69 (nice) at 1500m
23:36:33 > 30
23:36:35 > never dropped below 23 in combat
23:36:40 > usually 30
23:36:42 > looking out at the sea I have 80, but looking north I have 60
23:36:46 > approx 60, but all my settings are on max
23:36:50 > I’ve had crazy good fps
23:37:09 > Even on the later half of the mission
23:37:11 > lag was a much worse problem than fps for me
23:37:22 > that’s on your net
23:37:26 > 30 is lowest i got
23:38:19 > dw, I bled out in 3 minutes
23:40:12 > gotta go, thanks for the mission Shiny, see ya!
23:40:14 > Player Henrik disconnected
23:40:20 > I love jungle missions too. but with NVGs it turns often into almost slideshows in heavier engagements.
23:40:27 > yeah, op was fun regardless of all the weirdness
23:40:55 > sheep, volume
23:42:32 > yeah, good AT shot.
23:42:44 > thanks
23:43:12 > Maybe your volume is set to adjust on TS rather then a static activation. We can take a look after
23:43:16 > To sheep
23:43:24 > gotcha!
23:43:49 > NVG + Jungle is nervewracking and really fun, but yeah, has to be done with decent fps
23:44:34 > Player sheep disconnected
First of all, thank you for the mission and I can’t stress that enough. I know how much time it takes to make it.
I had severe performance issues around the club and found out why (see more in link below).
We really need to start paying attention to mission performance. I’ve played with other people many times on non-CNTO servers and our CNTO missions are performance wise, far too often severely worse compared to what we ran on other server.
Regarding the mission itself. Before the club we bunched up too much, formation was wrong, distance was wrong, speed was wrong. You can’t go wedge in a thick jungle, nor run, or jog. Did you ever see people in Vietnam running through the forest before contact? Objective was really not that far, we had a helicopter and I really do not understand this obsession with running in CNTO. Either use a vehicle if you’re in a hurry or do the deliberate movement, even if it means walking with weapons up. Our patrolling techniques resort to stumbling upon enemy that is ready for us in a jogging stance. I can’t remember the last time we made a soft contact with the enemy.
Club. At this point it came to my mind that this mission would be really nice for no more than 4 players. One, very narrow corridor to entry the club and 15-20 people trying to use one entrance. Most of us felt completely useless except picking up the guy who fell in front of us. I had a US Civil War feeling where we were marching towards the enemy muskets in several ranks.
I’d like to thank you for the mission. No matter if it goes smoothly or not It is always appreciated.
It was my first mission ever where I lead Bravo. I did my best to lead the small fireteam sized element. Despite good performence I do have some points to make which I will touch upon later in this thread.
I’ll go over the mission from the beginning to the end. I personally didn’t have any technical difficulties, only the performence drops during the jungle trip that dipped to low 15 fps at some points. Good thing that I didn’t get kicked by Battleye this time which was pleasant. However, the first technical difficulties I have noticed were at the very beginning where [user avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/7849506/avatar/small.1590497467.png” name=“Seb”]7849506[/user] and [user avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/8030574/avatar/small.1500627185.png” name=“Hateboarder”]8030574[/user] among other people couldn’t connect to the server. I honestly have no idea what caused It and I am nowhere close to being informed in this topic to make assumptions, but that did add up to the pile of problems we experienced this op.
Shortly after we had our 2 plane crashes which could be avoided with propper testing but that honestly wasn’t such a big deal as we got dropped in via the Chinook, it only added to further frustration. Personally during that period I experienced my own set of problems with [user avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/2292486/avatar/small.1400045390.png” name=“Anarchy”]2292486[/user] stating that I was super quiet over the radio, and that the rest of the squad was alright, making it even stranger was the fact he could hear me talking just fine. Another issue was [user avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/19716424/avatar/small.1540924361.jpeg” name=“Blodos”]19716424[/user] not being able to answer over the radio for some reason, by the time we have arrived in the AO, only Me and Anarchy arrived as [user avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/11341464/avatar/small.1553522842.png” name=“Clarke”]11341464[/user] couldn’t jump out of the helicopter…
Shortly after Me and Anarchy were assigned as the scouting element moving ahead of the whole available platoon. We did good just walking ahead, FPS and visibility lowering to almost none in the jungle which caused Me personally to get jumped by 2 A.I about 5 meters away from me. After swiftly dispatching of the contact I went to treat Anarchy who was knocked out, but I didn’t manage to move 2 steps as I was dropped by a friendly. Died on a spot.
I moved onto the VISCOM and started watching Bravo which after losing a leader and lacking propper cover by Alpha, got mowed down by an enemy element. Shortly I was joined by Anarchy and Bloodos on VISCOM while Clarke left, guessing caused by the frustration. Can’t blame him, most of Bravo got double tapped.
Skipping foward about 15 minutes when Alpha and Platoon arrives at the objective. It was apparent that AI was shooting through props while Alpha had trouble spotting them, there were a lot of deaths where people just straight up walked past an enemy or didn’t check corner that caused one buddy team to get cut down by a machinegunner hiding behind it. Also, nade discipline, DO NOT THROW GRENADES DANGER CLOSE TO THE FRIENDLIES. I am not sure who threw one of the grenades but I am pretty sure it hit some unconn friendlies.
I have a small request for the training team, can we have a dedicated CQB and Buddyteam training? Maybe night ops training too? We are doing great as an element but I still can see people running away from their "battle buddy", during this OP this was very apparent. People running off on their own and accordingly enough, meeting a much larger element.
Back to the cave siege. Some people stated they had low fps during the siege, for me personally it was fine. No major drops in the cave, however the music wasn’t playing either. Alpha dispatched of the enemies quickly, meanwhile Sheep laid outside glitched for a solid 10-15 minutes. Also, Baegel got eaten by the walls of the cave, spat out on the other side of it and shot. That caused our Platoon lead to leave the game, that made Alpha lead take over, which only added to confusion later.
Short while passes, Alpha grabs the DJ, proceed to extraction, Me as a Bravo lead took care of the reinforcements, met up with Alpha and we proceeded through earlier drawn route after adding a few suggestions. I didn’t agree with us crossing so close to the village but decided to go with it. Bravo took the role of the leading element again. As predicted, we got attacked when crossing the road close to the village and after dispatching the initial attack and making way for Alpha to cross the road somebody spotted a large element approaching us. I tried to hurry everybody up because half of the Alpha along with the hostage were stuck engaging the village for some reason.
After a brief wait I have decided to move out with Bravo to keep clearing the road foward while Alpha gets disengages. That did not happen and Bravo was forced to move back and provide support, further engaging the village we were not prepared to face. That lead to our VIP getting killed in action and Alpha being split in two with enemies inbetween. This is where op went from salvageable to mess around.
I do not hold any grudges agains anyone, I really don’t. But please, stick to your squad/buddy team. Do not run off. Do not shoot the "enemy" helicopter without the leader’s permission. Do not run off treating Alpha members without informing the leader (had a case of Bravo and Alpha medic treating 1 person while Bravo SQL got hit by a GL) and please, listen to the orders.
Rest of the mission just went downhill, comms were brief and unprecise, I tried to change the route to make it to the extract on time. That caused us to go through a town and a plantation full of enemies, thankfully, Bravo was on point with their shooting. After almost making it to the boats, I’ve heared a call over radio that reinforcements are coming and that the LZ needs to be marked. Honestly, I’ve made a mistake here, I marked an LZ that shortly got overran, then due to a communication error I’ve decided to take Bravo around the enemy occupied town, straight to the extraction point while the rest of the elements just started attacking the said town while being vastly outnumbered.
I personally didn’t make it to the extraction, neither did the Anarchy, we were left behind after being shot by some enemies that left the town to flank Alpha, however that is to be forgiven as at least half of Bravo made it out.
To summerize, Thanks again [user avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/3602631/avatar/small.1411590107.jpeg” name=“Shiny”]3602631[/user] for the op and all the time you’ve put into it. As I’ve mentioned yesterday, this OP looked better from CNTR than it played I guess. However, personally I did not enjoy it, everything was fighting my efforts but I did take some lessons from the mission that I will use in the future OPs.
Okay so since I’m being accused of leaving the game due to frustration, I’d just like to point out that:
My game kicked me to the role select screen, after which I then tried to reload in and was stuck in an endless loading screen. (Going from role select to map screen will not show as a reconnect attempt in logs [user avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/3602631/avatar/small.1411590107.jpeg” name=“Shiny”]3602631[/user] ) I gave it a solid 5 minutes before my game crashed. I then ordered food and loaded up another game.
As for the mission itself, all the technical issues have been covered so I won’t go into them any further.
What I do want to cover is the expectation of action.
As per the mission premise, we were to perform a HALO jump at night against an enemy that has no nightvision or even flashlights to maximise stealth.
We were explicitly told by high command to avoid the main roads and go through the jungle. It was double checked that the only the main roads are patrolled, not the jungle.
This is where we found ourselves after planning and jumping out of the helo:
As you can see, we painstakingly made a plan to keep within the limits of the OPORD and to avoid contact at all possible. The jungle paths might have some random civilian on them, a calculated risk. Perhaps even a two man patrol may be present, again, within reason.
This is 1 minute later:
A full two squads are spawned within our vicinity out of thin fucking air. In terms of numbers, they outnumbered us by about a fireteam. Further, they immediately spot our scout element, which was Bravo. I have never seen AI in Arma without NVGs being able to fire so effectively at us, and they wiped bravo.
As the situation was getting tense, and I was under the impression that our cover was blown and that the entire island was going to come crashing down, I called in Alpha and told them we need to move with speed.
This was our situation 3 minutes later:
Another squad, plus vehicles. The reaction time of the garrison on the island is superb, it seems. At this point we were royally fucked. Casualties all around. Something that was supposed to be a cool stealth intro into the mission with a high stakes breaching of a club in a jungle turned into a normal, boring slugfest with another platoon of AI. Only this time we were constricted by NVGs and the jungle, something the AI was not.
This is not fun.
We had a plan and with the information given by the GM, it was a pretty good one. I don’t know why we were punished by the Zeus for sticking to his premise, but we must’ve done something wrong to immediately have 3 squads and vehicles spawned near us.
Or was it?
I can’t read minds, but I believe this is one of those things that has been discussed recently: expectation of action.
As zeus, it is hard to gauge the mood of players on the ground. Firefights = action = good, most of the time.
But this is not always so. Tension has a value of its own. We don’t need to be constantly engaged by an enemy that outnumbers us 2:1, in a jungle that only he can see through, in the dark which only seems to impede us and not the AI.
In my humble opinion, having us successfully infiltrate without random spawning AI, have a firefight around the DJ and THEN being pursued by a numerically superior enemy would have made this more fun. It is not my mission though, and just my opinion.
I only want to point this out because I am guilty of it too, and so are many in MMT. We get into zeus, and spawn random stuff without thinking about how the enemy would actually react. We just think about action.
I think the only way to mitigate this is to preplace AI as much as possible. This is not always the solution, as for instance AI giving chase and reinforcements are hard to preplace, but for instance patrols and guards in the jungle around the objective should have more thought and time in Eden put into them.
First off thanks for the mission Shiny. Although Tano at night is not my favorite mission type ("when the trees start speaking local") still had a lot of fun.
As for the red team, you guy did great. One time you missed a call to move out and got a bit lost…which was unfortunate but happens (my fault).
I decided to regroup with my fire team (my role as FTL) and get them back on track. I called for a medic when I had casualties. I answered the radio, while in combat. I was as clear and concise as I could be. We got the order to move. I said Negative red cannot move. Please note as it was mentioned after, this is not insobordination, I’m not disagreeing with an order. I am stating a fact. We could not move without losing people. I was told to pick up my wounded and move. I responded red cannot move and ask for immediate support (as we were being surrounded). I was given an order to leave casualties behind (not my favorite order but there is a time and a place). I said it was not possible (at this stage we were fixed by fire). Even if I wanted to move we couldn’t.
I would also note approx 10mins before (this incident) yellow and SL were fixed by fire, with casualties and red did not receive an order to abandon them and move out with bravo. Instead red held the flank and protected their squad members from a full encirclement.
In all accounts, I stand by my decision and take responsibility for red team (and the medics) actions. Always happy for feedback. I apologize for missing the debriefing (as you can be sure I had somethings to say)… But I had personal commitments as mentioned during role selection.
Always happy and receptive to feedback.
On that particular scenario [user avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/20330489/avatar/small.1594394879.png” name=“Mattdogs”]20330489[/user] I’d like to make a point about Yellow holding our position. As stated in Discord chat I take the blame for not intervening earlier, but a mix of factors (orders to keep moving as fast as possible, BRAVO already moving out) made me hold position and wait for either you to break contact and join us or orders from SL to move on (which were kind of already given). Judging from CNTR recordings I doubt we could’ve helped, the position was barely defendable. But that’s a note for the next time, do ask SL if second fireteam can help as I imagine the amount of stress [user avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/2480304/avatar/small.1457115837.jpeg” name=“Ionaru”]2480304[/user] was already bearing.
I’m not a massive fan of jungle operations but I must admit that all in all it was a positive OP for me. I did not see all the enemies you threw at us [user avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/3602631/avatar/small.1411590107.jpeg” name=“Shiny”]3602631[/user] , CNTR reveals there were a lot more and I’m happy we didn’t have to face them all in the jungle. One big issue was going through fields and close to villages during the escape, but on the other hand I much prefer it rather than being stuck in a jungle for 1 more hour, even though we were kinda massacred. There wasn’t much coordination at the end, which I disliked, but that may also be due to the lack of PLT.
Anyway, despite being skeptical at the beginning and a bit pissed for all the technical issues (plane crashes included) the night took an unexpectedly bright turn when we found Softwell (RIP). I wish I had it recorded it was crazy, you made me laugh and follow the beat for a solid 15 mins.
Thank you for the mission Shiny, I do appreciate your effort regardless of how it went for us.
EDIT: One thing I forgot to mention and seems to happen often, and quick note for who was in Yellow FT. As Fireteam Leader I really don’t want to call out on people to follow orders. I don’t want to micromanage people because we’re all grown ups enough. So please, don’t make me yell over the radio to do what you were ordered to. Stick to your FTL and execute orders without wandering around the map or doing whatever you think you can do. If FTL says we move, we move. At once. Having 4 people in a 75m radius in a jungle is a pain in the bum to keep an eye on everyone. Also, there are pre-designated buddy teams, do stick to your buddy.
[quote user_id=“8061610” avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/8061610/avatar/medium.1616680218.jpeg” name=“Henrik”]
-snip-
EDIT: One thing I forgot to mention and seems to happen often, and quick note for who was in Yellow FT. As Fireteam Leader I really don’t want to call out on people to follow orders. I don’t want to micromanage people because we’re all grown ups enough. So please, don’t make me yell over the radio to do what you were ordered to. Stick to your FTL and execute orders without wandering around the map or doing whatever you think you can do. If FTL says we move, we move. At once. Having 4 people in a 75m radius in a jungle is a pain in the bum to keep an eye on everyone. Also, there are pre-designated buddy teams, do stick to your buddy.[/quote]
What you say here is true, but as FTL you do (not saying this was true in your case, talking in general here) have to make sure that your team actually heard and understood the orders. Just to give an example, when I and Killerbyte got left behind yesterday, we simply did not hear the move order, and we were watching our sector, so we also did not see the rest move out until we were basically alone. So yes, as team you need to stick to your FTL, but it is also up to the FTL to make sure the team is actually aware movement (or any order) is happening.
[user avatar=“https://assets-cloud.enjin.com/users/319225/avatar/small.1399937338.png” name=“Aether”]319225[/user] if we’re close enough that local voice is good I usually give orders by voice. Otherwise if needed I use 343 but not in case SL gave direct order to the squad, then I’m going to assume everybody listens to their radio.
That does not take away your responsibility as leader to actually lead your team. If you notice that your team is laggin behind, you got to grab them
What I said in my original reply mate. If you want me to yell at you just ask
Good point, however, one thing that CNTO doesn’t do but it is a super useful habbit to create is repeating orders after the leader. This not only passes the word foward to people further in formation but it also makes it easier for FTL fo make sure their order was heared.
I wish we did it more, it’s a very useful habbit to follow.
I always try to ask "how copy" after a send. If they don’t confirm they copy then I will repeat it.
Yeah same its a good habit.
Also as Sagu said it helps people know what happening. I usually relay a long order into something simple. Like "Roger, Red team moving north"