So I was gone for a while with work and class filling too much time to work on RS. Now, I still have a lot of my time taken up, but I've settled on a new RS-related project that will take much less effort on my part, which will allow me to work on it even with my other priorities. It's an RTS inspired by my favorite RTS of all time, Command & Conquer: Red Alert.

So pretty much you're the commander of a Red Skull army in the second BSP of a30; you deploy squads, select them, give them orders, and all that stuff. Basic rundown follows.


Controls:

You're a monitor (invisible to AI) with no weapons. You fly around and give your army commands - simple as that

The button to select a squad is 'use' while looking at them. Similarly, you can deselect a squad by pressing 'use' while looking at no squads.

After selecting a squad, a nav point appears over them to represent their selected status, and you're presented with options of locations to send them, represented by nav points (usually 3). The locations that you are offered depend upon where the squad currently is. For instance, if I select a squad at my base, I will have options to send them out to a valley. Once they reach the valley, I may be given options to send them back to base or farther away in a couple directions.

To order a squad to progress to a position, look at the nav point of the desired position and left-click to send them in an aggressive state (in which case they'll run with weapons ready) or right-click to send them in a patrol state (in which case they'll walk with weapons lowered, surveying the area).


Other features include:

Upgrades - pretty self-explanatory; purchase various things that will improve your combat units, such as a 50% chance that a squad will be lead by a Spartan 2 upon deployment.

Vehicles - you can order vehicles to be shipped to your base via dropship. It is my plan for these to be commanded individually. By using the 'special unit commands' section in your pause menu you can order a squad (possibly more than one) to follow one of your Red Skull tanks. The advantages of this are clear, as the squad now has a complement of heavy firepower; the tank, with infantry support, is less likely to succumb to being swarmed by enemies.

Bunker shelter - similar to ringing the town bell in Age of Empires, if you activate the 'take shelter' special unit command then units within range of your base will retreat to the underground bunker. After doing this, you may wish to use the 'base lockdown' special base command which seals the doors; no units can move in or out of the bunker. Alternatively, you may wish to simply leave the bunker unlocked and allow enemies to funnel into the bunker to be shot down in a manner that provides your men with a more easily defended position than the open battlefield.

Alliances - in pursuing the rebels to a halo ring, you have stumbled upon another conflict entirely; that of the Covenant and the sentinels. You may choose to ally with either side, each with its own small perks. If you wish for more of a challenge, you may remain neutral, or even declare both as enemies.

Raise defenses - using this special base command will send infantry within range of the base to the balcony of the main structure and the rooftops of the two smaller structures nearby. Additionally, there is a 20% chance that activating this will cause your ally to send reinforcements to your base.

More will come.

Mechanics implemented so far:

Mechanics added in most recent update will be in italics.
- Squad deployment
- Squad command
- Separate passive and aggressive migration modes
- Diversification of soldier class within squad (assault rifle supported by shotgun, sniper rifle supported by assault rifle)
- Chance for Spartan 2 leader to spawn as any soldier class (shotgun, sniper, or assault rifle)
- Multiple squads on the battlefield with ability to command them separately
- Base lockdown ability
- Options for squad locations are dependent upon current camera location
- Vehicles can be delivered
- Squads can be assigned to follow vehicles (not yet demonstrated, still in early stages)


Preview:

I would post more pictures but I believe that something like this is more easily demonstrated in video form. Therefore, I've begun a narrated series of episodes documenting the progress of this map. A new one should be posted every few days until completion.

Episode 1: For your viewing pleasure...
Episode 2: Lock it down, gentlemen.
Episode 3: Spreading out.

If you choose to subscribe, I thank you in advance.
Edited by The Cereal Killer on Oct 11, 2012 at 10:29 PM

Glad to see some progress finally, looks interesting.

Thanks; and I do remember. I believe I posted in your thread about how I had a similar idea some time ago.

Welcome back CK.

Didn't you post this on ModHalo too?

The spartan looks terrible :(

I agree.It could be better.

I don't see a big problem with how the S2s look at the moment, but I'm not attached to it anyway; I was in the middle of messing with colors and reflection when I decided to get gameplay out of the way first.

I definitely like that dark red though; and the black is placeholder. Reflection is the biggest problem right now.

I've gotten a lot more developed since the last episode this morning, and I've already filmed the third episode. I'm going to make you wait 'til tomorrow though.

'Night.

No I mean the shaders look bleh. The color is fine, but the cubemap and fakebumping....
Edited by XlzQwerty1 on Oct 10, 2012 at 07:21 PM

So I lied and I actually will be on for a little longer today.


Yeah Bourrin asked me if I wanted to use them, I told him I might end up. I'll take a look. I'm not sure what everyone sees wrong with the current skin though, I like it :L

Out of curiosity, I'll take a pic of it vs the stock Mk VI skin side by side and you tell me which you like better.

Help in what way?

So here's my curiosity question: do you like the original or the one I'm using better? (Exclude reflection and color.)



I only ask this because they are two different art styles, and I may be liking the new one simply because I like crisp lines and dark colors.

You should switch the visors.I like the brighter one.Maybe you can aim for something in between.Not very dark or very bright.

There he is with the brighter visor.

I may tamper with the reflection settings a bit more. You might like him if he's not so contrastingly shiny.

Look at you guys, getting me to mess with visuals instead of script.

You should be ashamed of yourselves.
Edited by The Cereal Killer on Oct 10, 2012 at 09:54 PM

I think the contrast is the problem.
Maybe you should make the color lighter,to decrease the contrast.
I'll go tamper it for you,if you want.
Edited by Dumb AI on Oct 10, 2012 at 09:55 PM

Yeah I had suspected the contrast.

Thanks guys for the suggestion of Bourrin's MkV, I'm not replacing the MkVI with it but I'm adding it in as well for more variety. You might get a Spartan 2 wearing Mk V or Mk VI.

I'm also going to copy the reflection settings that Bourrin used and see if that looks good.

Alright, I think I'm finally offline for tonight. I'll fiddle with it a bit more, and I'll snag some clips of it and tag it to the end of the latest documentary episode so you can critique it tomorrow.
Edited by The Cereal Killer on Oct 10, 2012 at 10:18 PM

My shaders should look pretty good on a MK VI (even better on the helmet),
but I'm re doing the main piece because it had very bad smoothing groups, the one I'm doing right now will look better.
I'll give it to everyone as soon as it's finished

TCK! glad to see you back at work on this man :D Im excited to see it. Hop of xfire if you want some help, and generally so I can talk to you :P

Episode 3: Spreading out is up. Video compression makes the reds look a bit more purple than they are, but here's a pic so you know for sure.

Previous reflection:


New reflection:


Yes they do look good on the Mark 6.

Yeah :) I'm on Xfire now, I'll stay logged in until about 7 EST.

Well thank you for offering. Unfortunately, the only thing being done right now is the writing of, and coordinating of, hundreds upon hundreds of lines of script :P

Beyond that, the only thing to do is organize firing positions and command lists for the ~30 possible RS infantry squads, ~15 RS ground vehicles, and ~5 RS air vehicles (don't forget the crap needed by the other three teams). I doubt that's the sort of thing you're into, since you aren't into scripting; even so, the script and AI have such an intimate relationship that they must be done by the same person :L

The only thing I can think of is if you can do third-person animations. I wasn't planning to have cutscenes that were too in-depth here, to cut down on time, but animation is the biggest time-consumer in the cinematic process. It's feasible if I'm not the one doing the animation.

Hey. I made a multipurpose map tutorial a while ago before I stopped porting and you might want to look at that. It was for my reach Spartans I released in some thread :p.

6.

Edited by Cheddars on Oct 11, 2012 at 07:02 PM

I didn't make the multipurpose map myself (I don't do any sort of texturing), I just know that it's caused by that. Thank you though.

Squads can exist without any script. You can even have a decent fight with enemies without any scripting. Script is just needed to control the squad. At least, that's how squad_blocks in Sapien work; the squads in RSC&C are controlled by a set of static scripts that are activated by a mother script. The mother script retrieves the location of the player (which is a variable that is maintained by a continuous script checking the volumes on the map) and activates the appropriate commands based on the location. The selected squad, to which the set of static scripts issue command lists, is determined by a separate script for each squad. The appropriate set of static scripts is called by the mother script, and the selected squad is commanded by substituting the variable of the current squad. I'll post it and explain it in detail later on, for anyone who might be interested in making their own RTS.

So to answer your question: in Sapien terms, no; in RSC&C terms, yes.

Sounds good!
Edited by The Cereal Killer on Oct 11, 2012 at 07:19 PM

I found yer thread.

Also I have a couple of ideas I want to talk to you about on xfire when you can.