What I'm sorely missing is missions that involve real life factions and geopolitics. Let's face it, the Armaverse is not convincing. The whole CSAT alliance is a frail idea given real life realities, and no tiny island such as Altis will be granted with independence and an own defence force. Even if you don't agree with my analysis, you'd agree that real life will always be more convincing, anyway.
Therefore, why not base missions on real-life nationalities, factions and geography? So CSAT become Iranians, or specifically the
Revolutionary Guards, the AAF becomes the
Hellenic Armed Forces and FIA can become the
PKK or whatever irregular force that comes to your mind. Altis can be Cyprus, so what if it's much much smaller? The connection to real life makes it worthwhile. The second real world actors and places are used, the mission's flavor change and becomes much stronger.
I feel that nationalities could be stretched even farther. I wouldn't mind playing a CSAT unit that plays a Turkish unit in the mission, for example.
If we throw addons into this idea, there are almost no limitations. I am eager to play missions that take part in the Ukrainian revolution, in Syria's civil war, in Lebanon, in Sinai. We have such a wonderful scenario generator, why in most of our missions, we limit ourselves to some shitty, highly limited, politically-correct universe that no one cares about? Think how immersive it will be to play the Free Syrian Army in an operation against the Syrian Army or against ISIS? Tamil Tigers against Sri Lankan forces. The possibilities are endless. The immersion factor is massive.
I am aware that there will be discrepancies such as ingame tags, different language spoken by the AI, Geographical areas that do not completely resemble the correct environment, but these can be easily overlooked if the scenario is even somewhat convincing.
What are your guys thoughts on this?
Some wonderful examples:
- Wiggum's missions (note the liberty he takes with national identities and locations, and his missions are great, spoken from experience).
- Domestus' awesome Syrian rebellion Arma 2 campaign. Can't find it online, but those of you who played with us back in the Arma 2 days, know what I talk about.
- RWO Real World Operations - An initiative to bring to life real world operations in Arma that started in Arma 2. However, made up scenarios with real actors and places is just fine and will already boost the mission's immersion, no need for a documentary styled scenarios.
To be honest, I rarely, if at all, use real-life factions. The reason isn't political correctness, or that I don't want to offend these factions, but I just don't really see the need for it.
I mean, if I say that the opponents are middle-eastern insurgents, is there any doubt it's something like ISIS or the Taliban?
Another reason, especially when using things like AAF for Hellenic Army, is that they don't have either the equipment nor the uniforms of those. I once had a mission were I wanted to have a support team from the IDF, but didn't do it because the uniforms don't fit. That, for me, is a bigger problem than real-life names.
Also, since I am a bit obsessive with fact-checking, I don't want to misrepresent anything.
I dunno, might sound weird, but for me, it never was an issue.
As I said, these discrepancies will surely be there, but it's worth it given the expected immersion boost. Did it bother that in Wiggum's mission we played the units we played against were not really pro-Turkish separatists? Well, a bit, but it was cool, it sets the environment, it gets the occurences closer to one's heart and makes the mission, at least for me, much more exciting.
In Fuiba's campaign, when we had to shoot down Greek reinforcement choppers, did it matter much that the Hellenic Army doesn't use that type of transports? Not much, but it still was a great touch that made the mission a lot more exciting. I'm not saying that these misrepresentations don't matter, I'm saying that it's worth it, because real life is much more interesting and engaging than some "whateververse".
Quote:I mean, if I say that the opponents are middle-eastern insurgents, is there any doubt it's something like ISIS or the Taliban?
For starters, ME insurgents is a great start when compared to the stuff we have in the vanilla game (much like Wiggum's "pro-Turkish" separatists"), however, using ISIS or Taliban would be even better, definitely. It makes it more, well, real.
If you used IDF in that mission and used, for example, AAF units, it would have been great, and that comes from a person that knows what equipment and uniforms to expect from an IDF unit.
I can tall you why I don't want to make "real world missions":
I don't want to bother with real world conflicts. They are complicated, and I totally lack any background knowledge of most current or past conflicts. I have only cursory knowledge about military structure. I have no idea about how real briefings look like (except some basic stuff I learned in my army times).
Basically, I'm a total noob when it comes to military, military history, past conflicts and all the details that I would need to know to make this convincing.
As an example: I could go an make a mission that pits mujahideen against Russian forces. I happen to know the mujahideen were active in Afghanistan, but what if they I didn't and would put them into Tajikistan or Pakistan ? Or get the time period completely wrong ? That would destroy the whole mission.
When I start with a new mission, it USUALLY comes from one of two factors: 1) I see an area on a map, like a valley or something, and think of something that could happen there, or 2) I think of some thing that I would like to make, like in Finder's Keepers, I thought it would be cool to have to frankenstein some APC that was disabled and use it agains the enemy.
Real life scenarios require you to think of what the faction you play is planning. Like, if you know you play PKK, you need to know what their goals are. I know the PKK are Kurds, and that's basically it, I don't even know what faction they are fighting against.
I wouldn't go about and make a mission with real parties and NOT research them, because that's how I work. If I would do a mission where you play PKK, I would check what weapons they use, and not deviated from that (I know they are not backed by the US, so no M4/M16, contrary to, say anything coming from Irak).
The end result would be that I need to research, and that removes my mind from the mission, and that in some ways hinders my creativity. Dunno how to express this, really, but it's similar to what BI said when they announced 2035, they wanted the artistic freedom to do what they want. I'm similar in that respect.
Add to that that I'm not really that interested in real life conflicts, and you get to a situation where doing a mission with real life background would become a drag for me. If you look at the missions I made, they are mostly vanilla...
(02-03-2016, 03:19 PM)Variable link Wrote:As I said, these discrepancies will surely be there, but it's worth it given the expected immersion boost. Did it bother that in Wiggum's mission we played the units we played against were not really pro-Turkish separatists? Well, a bit, but it was cool, it sets the environment, it gets the occurences closer to one's heart and makes the mission, at least for me, much more exciting.
I don't even remember these missions, to be honest.
(02-03-2016, 03:19 PM)Variable link Wrote:In Fuiba's campaign, when we had to shoot down Greek reinforcement choppers, did it matter much that the Hellenic Army doesn't use that type of transports?
Did it matter that they are Greek ? Quite honestly, that wouldn't matter to me at all, I go with AAF if need be
(02-03-2016, 03:20 PM)Varanon link Wrote:I have only cursory knowledge about military structure. I have no idea about how real briefings look like (except some basic stuff I learned in my army times).
I don't think you should care how military briefings look like. 90% of the people reading the briefing are not the commander, and they wouldn't get any written order, anyway. Their Sergeant will come, tell them to saddle up, and they'd get a verbal, mostly very vague briefing. THAT would be a much better briefing if you ask me as long it will include all the necessary information.
(02-03-2016, 03:20 PM)Varanon link Wrote:Basically, I'm a total noob when it comes to military, military history, past conflicts and all the details that I would need to know to make this convincing.
As an example: I could go an make a mission that pits mujahideen against Russian forces. I happen to know the mujahideen were active in Afghanistan, but what if they I didn't and would put them into Tajikistan or Pakistan ? Or get the time period completely wrong ? That would destroy the whole mission.
You don't need to be more than a noob in that sense. A short wikipedia read (and I talk about 30 seconds short, not 20 minutes short) will give you everything you need in terms of eras, equipment and factions. It litteraly a minute of research. Just think how cool it would be to get the opening text "February 1981, Afghanistan".
(02-03-2016, 03:20 PM)Varanon link Wrote:When I start with a new mission, it USUALLY comes from one of two factors: 1) I see an area on a map, like a valley or something, and think of something that could happen there, or 2) I think of some thing that I would like to make, like in Finder's Keepers, I thought it would be cool to have to frankenstein some APC that was disabled and use it agains the enemy.
I understand that, but "dressing" the mission in real life "clothes" can come afterwards. Even after the mission is done. Just change a few names and it's already much shiner.
(02-03-2016, 03:20 PM)Varanon link Wrote:Real life scenarios require you to think of what the faction you play is planning. Like, if you know you play PKK, you need to know what their goals are. I know the PKK are Kurds, and that's basically it, I don't even know what faction they are fighting against.
I wouldn't go about and make a mission with real parties and NOT research them, because that's how I work. If I would do a mission where you play PKK, I would check what weapons they use, and not deviated from that (I know they are not backed by the US, so no M4/M16, contrary to, say anything coming from Irak).
No need to go into in-depth research like RWO does (see OP). And getting back to the process. Wouldn't reading just a bit about, say the Ukrainian conflict will trigger your imagination? If not for you maybe for other mission makers, of course.
(02-03-2016, 03:19 PM)Variable link Wrote:As I said, these discrepancies will surely be there, but it's worth it given the expected immersion boost. Did it bother that in Wiggum's mission we played the units we played against were not really pro-Turkish separatists? Well, a bit, but it was cool, it sets the environment, it gets the occurences closer to one's heart and makes the mission, at least for me, much more exciting.
To be perfectly honest, I don't remember these missions. The "real-world" factor for me never was an issue when it comes to immersion. It may be because I am not very well informed about the specifics of these conflicts (I am not "illeterate"when it comes to global politics, I'd wager to say I am better informed than the average, but I don't really "research" these conflicts). So for me, personally, it never mattered whether the Chedaki exist or not, if I was into the setting, it was as real for me as if these were Ukrainian or anything else.
Quote:In Fuiba's campaign, when we had to shoot down Greek reinforcement choppers, did it matter much that the Hellenic Army doesn't use that type of transports? Not much, but it still was a great touch that made the mission a lot more exciting.
This is actually the point I cannot follow, to be honest. To me it didn't matter that the choppers were not Hellenic Army, I didn't care if it were AAF or something else, it does nothing for me. I mean, I will gladly use "Russians" or "Americans" because, well, in game they are Russians and Americans, but other than that the fact that the faction is fictitious (difficult sentence) doesn't make a difference.
On the contrary, when I used the AAF in Greenback Mountain, I didn't like it because they were AAF and not really supposed to be there. But calling them anything else but AAF would cause the same issue for me.
But then, I am the guy that is opposed to infantry flying choppers...
Quote:For starters, ME insurgents is a great start when compared to the stuff we have in the vanilla game (much like Wiggum's "pro-Turkish" separatists"), however, using ISIS or Taliban would be even better, definitely. It makes it more, well, real.
I rather think the contrary in this case. I cannot get myself to call Takistan Afghanistan, even though it basically is (it's based on Afghan terrain). So for me, in my head, it will always be Takistan, and that is a non-existent location to begin with. I prefer to keep my insurgents generic.
The only time I use real-life factions is when I want to evoke a specific situation or mindset. For example, if I want to make a mission about the Russian Afghanistan war, I would call them Mujahedeen because it immediately evokes that specific setting. For most of my other missions, were this type of background isn't required, I don't go through this, mostly because I don't want to fact-check everything. If I start to do that, I lose motivation and inspiration for the mission.
As an example, in Evening Shift I used "Taliban" as the opponents. As I made the mission it occurred to me that the Taliban might not have been active in the North Waziristan Agency which the FATA map depicts, and went to check online if they did. Turns out there were Taliban active in the region. If there hadn't, well, I was actually thinking of scrapping the mission.
Quote:If you used IDF in that mission and used, for example, AAF units, it would have been great, and that comes from a person that knows what equipment and uniforms to expect from an IDF unit.
I was actually considering making IDF uniforms for my uniform pack just for this mission. I am this kind of person, because this mission was supposed to be based on geopolitical facts (Syria, the Balkan war) and was supposed to take place at the Syrian border near Israel. But, as I said, I do this only if I want to set a specific mood, and that requires me to have made this mission specifically for this purpose. If I "just make a mission", I don't and I can't work like this.
I hope this makes sense
My 2 gold dragons from one authors point of view:
I design my missions for fun, not as political statements. I'm not political person in the least and I don't usually participate to (political) debates in forums. Enough of that in other medias. While I am not the most politically incorrect mission maker (I don't need to mention names : P ) of the house, no faction is safe in my missions. In fact I have just finished a mission where you play as Russian infantry in Finland. Yet I have certain people, usually from certain nation, complaining in my workshop why I put them as OPFOR blablabla. I don't like it when people bring nationalistic BS to gaming. In my missions, there are no good or bad factions, just soldiers doing their duty on both sides.
That said, Arma may not be only a game, but it still is a game. People play it to forget troubles and toils of rl. I don't mind playing missions like Oil Leak now and then, while the setup is tongue in cheek enough, but I am not sure I would find it fun to play certain factions.
I do strive for certain authenticity in my missions and like to get as much details right as I can. I usually tell player what is his unit, and what unit he is fighting and why. In A3verse those are fictional but when I involve RHS stuff, I use real existing units and try to cook up even a small background story why conflict is taking place. But those islands are still fictional, and the conflicts are fictional.
I do read quite much and I do have decent knowledge of the , say Syrian conflict. It is messy ugly cauldron with zillion factions and I don't know if I want to dip in. I don't want to play a moron shooting AK from hip or killing his buddy with a RPGÂ backblast. Ok I can choose another faction, but still. That is a one extremely ugly conflict which can have potentially even uglier consequences. It isn't political correctness, and it isn't like I can't RP a bit and get it on. I am not sure if I can explain it. Technically it isn't any different than US vs Isil in Takistan. Lets just say if someone makes missions there and they end up on our server, ok I'm in, but not my first picks.
Of current missions:
If you want not-so-far fetched scenario, my Winter missions aren't that much scifi. If Thirsk Winter really existed in Baltic, like the fictional lore in my mission background dictates, my winter missions wouldn't be entirely unrealistic (operationally they are very downscaled as island is small as heck but that's another issue). Unfortunately, as that conflict would likely involve me personally.
10 years ago worst thing to happen in Baltic Sea would have been oil disaster. Now, it is entirely different thing. Russian politics,military buildup, tensions, willingness to project power outside its borders, Ukrainian incident/incursion, etc. In case of conflict, Baltic countries will be likely very uncomfortable places and certain islands of Finland and Sweden can expect visitors from VDV who won't be using passport and I likely have something to do with it if thing hits the fan. However I still make missions for VDV as no faction is safe in Stag missions : D
Btw Alwarren: My Shayetet-13 units are happy with their vanilla A3 olive-green-sweater uniforms, Tavors,and are inserted with vanilla assaultboats. If I make mission like that, so can you : D (Oh and I have voice actor already. Want me to recommend certain server admin to do the part? : D)Â
I'm afraid I have to say I don't think it's worth the hassle. As soon as you start trying to replicate real-world stuff then you'll get people complaining that such and such isn't accurate, that you don't know what you're talking about, etc. Sure, you're always gonna get some idiots who will find some excuse to complain but it seems pointless to expose yourself to this particular sort of criticism, as people can get very passionate about such details.
IMHO it's a better use of one's time to concentrate on making fun and properly balanced missions (as discussed in another thread), rather than on making them accurately replicate real-world politics or factions. I'm not bothered either way whether missions replicate the real-world or not, I just wouldn't recommend that someone try to make them unless they're confident about doing so and prepared to receive the inevitable complaints.
(02-03-2016, 04:53 PM)Stagwine link Wrote:Btw Alwarren: My Shayetet-13 units are happy with their vanilla A3 olive-green-sweater uniforms, Tavors,and are inserted with vanilla assaultboats. If I make mission like that, so can you : D (Oh and I have voice actor already. Want me to recommend certain server admin to do the part? : D)
The Tavor's naturally offer themselves to IDF, as well as the Merkava's and Namer's. It's just that I want the uniforms.
(02-03-2016, 05:03 PM)doveman link Wrote:Sure, you're always gonna get some idiots who will find some excuse to complain but it seems pointless to expose yourself to this particular sort of criticism, as people can get very passionate about such details.
I think it's a mistake taking into account what some idiot might say.
(02-03-2016, 05:03 PM)doveman link Wrote:IMHO it's a better use of one's time to concentrate on making fun and properly balanced missions (as discussed in another thread), rather than on making them accurately replicate real-world politics or factions.
I think I wrote at least 5 times that it SHOULDN'T be historically accurate, and of course it shouldn't be a replication.
(02-03-2016, 05:14 PM)Alwarren link Wrote:The Tavor's naturally offer themselves to IDF, as well as the Merkava's and Namer's. It's just that I want the uniforms.
Re-Texture them
My issue would be either me or someone else complaining that the game assets used don't represent the real life scenario referenced like "I'm from Unspecificedstan and my country's army doesn't use that gun", like Alwarren&Varanon already said or there'd be people stirring up a shitstorm because the issue is personal for them like "theres that guy that makes missions where you play as people I hate".
Then again we played a bardosy mission where we had to fight Middle East refugees and I know I forgot that and treated it as yet another mission pretty soon after start.
If i were to make missions i will go with real life factions/countries/military. Just because its easier to come up with a narative.
Likely I wouldn't try to copy real life events that happened, i would just copy-paste factions + known behaviors + location to come up with some Sander type missions .
example : US troops are tasked with freeing an iraqi town captured by the taliban