Comrades in Arms Discussion Board

Having discovered MCC

http://www.armaholic.com/page.php?id=15546

I'm now working on my next mission. This will be (ostensibly) #1 in a multi-mission series. I will write it in the SP editor and get it working as an SP mission using MCC, and then worry about adding the FHQ / coop stuff after it is all assembled.

The overall concept is to create a mission (hopefully a series) that has a similar kind of feel to the PMC Versus missions, except: set in Takistan well after the completion of the Operation Arrowhead storyline, and involving the players as Takistani partisans (Independent side I guess and "Takistani Locals faction) struggling against BLUFOR "occupiers" of Takistan. Idea is to mainly pit Takistan locals against US Army, but maybe in later missions have some OPFOR or other BLUFOR factions.

I think I want the players to be portraying "Independent" side in order to leave open the possibility for missions fighting against both BLUFOR and OPFOR. My idea being that BLUFOR has finished its conquest of Takistan and occupied the country and is now in 'maintenance' and regime-installation mode. However, there could be some OPFOR covert meddling and this could lead to the INDEPENDENT's taking some actions against OPFOR in one or two missions, but having 'proven themselves' perhaps receiving diplomatic overtures of backing by OPFOR who would like to mess up BLUFOR's interests in post-War Takistan. If I do manage to get up some momentum with this, I'd like to extend it out to many missions eventually culminating in BLUFOR withdrawal from Takistan and "liberation" of Takistan by proper Islamic fundamentalist authority!  :-*

It will require:
ACE
ACE_X, and
(maybe) MCC.

I would prefer if I could create the mission(s) using MCC, and then somehow change it so that the final .pbo does not actually require MCC to play it. If that is possible that is the way I will do it. But for now, I just want to get going with learning to use MCC, and putting together a mission.

There seem to be a paucity of missions with players as Takistani geurilla types, so hopefully this mission(s) will be a welcome addition to an otherwise empty niche. So that is the concept, now for the questions:

1. The title of the mission? I'm not entirely happy with just calling this first mission "Jihad." The first mission will involve capturing some weapons, freeing a hostage, maybe blowing up some shit, then escaping. Second mission might involve evading pursuit. Third might involve something like scouting out a location to setup a 'hideout.' Fourth, setting up an ambush, Fifth destroy something, etc., etc.

Any suggestions on a naming convention to apply in mission #1 that will fit with these themes, and work well for subsequent missions?

2. A name for the Takistani player side portrayed in the mission?

I have no idea what the native language of Takistan is (nor what branch of Islam is supposed to be prevalent), so I'm a bit of a loss for what this group might call itself. I would prefer them to have more of "Islamic fundamentalist PMC" type feel, though I don't want to call them anything like "PMC Fi sabilillah." I would like a name that references some historical concept or group within middle-eastern history. I'd particularly like to create some reference to the Nizari Ismalis, who are the group from which the term "assassin" seems to have originated

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nizari

I know some of you guys have some expertise in Islamic culture so please advise if you have a good idea.

1. Crimson Jihad?
2. Pick one out from the Islamic history. I believe Buraq was Muhammad's horse. Muslims are literally turned on by the Buraq myth, and it also sounds cool.
3. What do you mean by "Islamic fundamentalist PMC"? To me it sounds like a mix between contradicting terms.

I think that for the setup you want to make will shine in the first Afghanistan war. The one with the Soviets. For me it will be VERY appealing to fight the soviets in the 80's in a guerrilla-like setup like you want. I can't understand how with Takistan and the vanilla units we have in the game no one made such a scenario. Actually there is one, I believe it's called "The Lion from Sakhe". If you'll do that, it will be awesome! Just need some 80's Russian units, but I think also the vanilla russians will do.

(05-14-2013, 09:13 AM)Variable link Wrote: [ -> ]1. Crimson Jihad?

Watched "True Lies", eh?

Don't think so... I think I just merged between the concept of Crimson Revolution (historically relevant) and what Anthropoid came up with. What's the term use there?

(05-13-2013, 04:17 PM)Anthropoid link Wrote: [ -> ]2. A name for the Takistani player side portrayed in the mission?

I have no idea what the native language of Takistan is (nor what branch of Islam is supposed to be prevalent)

Takistani speak Farsi. Takistan essentially is Afghanistan, so I suppose all the

For names, I use a name generator like this one: http://www.fakenamegenerator.com/gen-male-fa-us.php
I like it because it generates a complete identity

Yep, and Farsi is the language of the Iranians (and some other people I don't remember)

(05-14-2013, 01:05 PM)Variable link Wrote: [ -> ]Don't think so... I think I just merged between the concept of Crimson Revolution (historically relevant) and what Anthropoid came up with. What's the term use there?

NIce, because the (rather comical at time) terrorist group in the movie is called Crimson Jihad as well.. I thought the movie was hilarious, best Bond movie ever and it wasn't even a Bond movie

ADDIT:
Think I found my transcription tool (actually not transliteration like I was calling it)
http://mylanguages.org/farsi_romanization.php

This gives:

?????? = wfadar

Cleaning that up to insert the implicit vowels I get:

"Wefadar"

So I guess I wasn't too far off.

For a name for the player group I think I'm gonna go with "Faithful Lions" = ??? ?????? =  Sheyr_Wefadar

Then for each mission, I'll just use English words/phrases that have some salience within Sunni Islam else Afghan history, translate them to Farsi, then transcript the Farsi into Latin alphabet, for example:

Recompense the unfaithful = ????? ????? = gheramet ayen gherd werzey

That particular phrase is a bit longish, so I'll try to do shorter stuff, but that is the basic idea to follow at this point.

-=-=-=-

Ah, excellent guys thanks!

I've been poking around looking for some translating/transliterating online apps, but that name generator sounds awesome. I had kind of gathered that they were speaking Persian because in my poking around I had encountered the wiki transliteration page for Persian, and noticed that the Roman letter "A" is "Sefr" in Persian and "Sefr Dreesh" is one of the phrases I know I've heard my AI say many times. Plus it just didn't sound like Arabic to my untrained ear.

So based on that I'm gonna guess they are 'implicitly' Sunni Muslims and perhaps even safe to assume that a strict Deobandi interpretation isn't unreasonable. All very helpful in formulating coherent backstory and 'themes' . . .

For the name of the 'Squad' I'm leaning toward this word I found using Babylon English to Persian translator:

Faithful = ??????

My bumbling efforts to transliterate those letters resulted in this:

Quote:??????
redfr
? 
13 ? r ra re ro r? ri ru
? e

?
3 ? d da de do d? di du

?
5 ? f fa fe fo f? fi fu

? 13 ? r ra re ro r? ri ru

Hmmmm . . . . versus the Soviets eh? That does sound kind've appealing and I'd find lots of historical material. I guess running it with CWR2 would facilitate the 1980's feel . . . I'm gonna take that under serious consideration.

(05-14-2013, 03:57 PM)Anthropoid link Wrote: [ -> ]So based on that I'm gonna guess they are 'implicitly' Sunni Muslims and perhaps even safe to assume that a strict Deobandi interpretation isn't unreasonable.

The Persians are mostly Shiites.

(05-14-2013, 03:57 PM)Anthropoid link Wrote: [ -> ]Hmmmm . . . . versus the Soviets eh? That does sound kind've appealing and I'd find lots of historical material. I guess running it with CWR2 would facilitate the 1980's feel . . . I'm gonna take that under serious consideration.

Awesome! That would be just awesome...

(05-14-2013, 04:39 PM)Variable link Wrote: [ -> ]The Persians are mostly Shiites.
Awesome! That would be just awesome...

Okay! Your enthusiasm for that theme cinches it!

Late 1970s - 1980s Mujahideen versus Soviets it is!

I wonder if CWR2 will play nice with ACE and ACE_X ?

I know you guys are slightly ambivalent about ACE, but I just absolutely love it. Agree there are certain features in it that are excessive or tedious, but on the whole the functionality that it adds is just too good to pass up imo. Particularly:
Rucks for EVERYONE!
Enhanced Encumbrance and fatigue system
Additional utility items (earplugs, gasmasks, key cuffs) and associated weapons (flashbangs, cn gas, etc.)
More realistic and consistent optics (e.g., only AN/PVS, M110 and NSPU optic types are useable with Night vision)
Enhanced ammo (inclusion of hollow point rounds, AP rounds, high charge rounds)
More variety in standard weapon types (more hand grenades, more variants on standard rifles, more pistols, more smgs)
Enhanced wounding system (e.g., shrapnel wounds, blast wounds and of course the more detailed medical gear)
Better explosives deployment system (burying, and alternative detonation methods)
More variety of explosives and mines (anti-personnel landmines, more AT and mines that are effective against light vehicles)

And last but not least:

The HK MP5A5 M203 <- For a sniper-phile, that weapon right there (combined with the ability to stash one weapon in your ruck or on your back) is sufficient reason to use ACE

Great news!

About ACE. I actually likes it, but I think that for a 70s-80s theme such as the first Afghanistan war there are a lot of weapons or features in ACE that simply won't fit in. Before you decide, I recommend to assess if adding ACE will be worth it.

(05-14-2013, 05:08 PM)Variable link Wrote: [ -> ]Great news!

About ACE. I actually likes it, but I think that for a 70s-80s theme such as the first Afghanistan war there are a lot of weapons or features in ACE that simply won't fit in. Before you decide, I recommend to assess if adding ACE will be worth it.

For a 70's scenario, sticking to M16A3's used by the Takistani might be the better idea anyway. M4's were only used after 1994.

I think the Mujahideen used mostly soviet hardware. Most of it previously owned by the Afghani government.

(05-14-2013, 05:13 PM)Variable link Wrote: [ -> ]I think the Mujahideen used mostly soviet hardware. Most of it previously owned by the Afghani government.

Yeah, but wasn't the mujahideen heavily sponsored by the CIA (note the capital I )? From what I know, the fact that the Takistani use western Equipment a lot is because they got the weapons form the US.

(05-14-2013, 05:08 PM)Variable link Wrote: [ -> ]Great news!

About ACE. I actually likes it, but I think that for a 70s-80s theme such as the first Afghanistan war there are a lot of weapons or features in ACE that simply won't fit in. Before you decide, I recommend to assess if adding ACE will be worth it.

Agree. However, as long as ACE won't mess it up, I'm inclined to use it. I will make sure no incongruous post-period weapons wind up in the mission, and since I'm such a gear fondler that will be a fun part of making the mission(s).

Re: what you guys were saying on TS tonight about AT being nerfed a bit in ACE compared to vanilla: I tend to think that that is a good thing. Also I _believe_ that the point of impact makes a bigger difference in ACE than in vanilla? Shoot a T-55 in the butt versus the tracks or worse the front and big diff, eh?