OFFbase: The Barmy Automated Squadron Experience for Over Flanders Fields

[Bletchley]

"Thank you for 3P in the first place, Bletchley"

 

I just adapted it for OFF, it was created by Bluevoss and Jeff Dillman (JG1Beck) for RB3D :)

 

"How 'bout people with longer names have a higher threshold, blame it on the paper pushers."Thank you for 3P in the first place, Bletchley"

 

Or by personality type?

 

"Still can't find it. The latest mod I see is the weight mod."

 

It isn't there at the moment, Wodin - every time Lothar adds a new updated version the old one will vanish, and it takes a day or so for the new version to appear - so just keep on checking :)

 

 

Bletchley

Edited November 2, 2011 by Bletchley

[+Polovski]

Maybe also refresh the page properly, ctrl+f5

[Herr Prop-Wasche]

Thank you for 3P in the first place, Bletchley, giving purpose to my OFF modding.

 

Just posted version 0.5.4, which should be a real crowd pleaser. Herr Prop-Wasche, I think you'll appreciate what happens when you crash your plane and survive to face a tyrannical leader, bully, or natural enemy as flight leader.

Very cool. Thanks for adding that encounter I dreamed up, although I hope it doesn't actually happen to me!

 

Creaghorn, a step in the right direction: at least priests will no longer become drinking buddies or fops engage in boxing with each other. Gave fops something else to do with each other

Ha, ha! So they become busom buddies, right? Regular bunkmates, as it were!

[Creaghorn]

don't know why, but after a sortie instead of the interface appearing for the campaign getting synchronized, there is the menu again to choose my squad and pilot. when i try to choose my pilot again it freezes. what happened?

[+Lothar of the Hill People]

don't know why, but after a sortie instead of the interface appearing for the campaign getting synchronized, there is the menu again to choose my squad and pilot. when i try to choose my pilot again it freezes. what happened?

Not sure Creaghorn, though I might have introduced a bug when I reworked the scheduler for 0.5.4. Does this happen every time? Is there any text in the minimized console window? Copy and paste it to a PM and I'll take a look.

[Wodin]

It must have been just bad luck that everytime I went to get it you had just put up a new version!

 

Have it now.

 

Will try it out tomorrow!

 

Thansk mate.

[+Lothar of the Hill People]

Glad you finally got it, Wodin. There's a new version now, 0.5.5, that fixes a crash that mostly affects bombers. If it's not showing up at Combat Ace yet you can download it here.

[vonOben]

Great idea Lothar!

 

Thanks a lot for making this mod, especially OFFbase!

 

I also appreciate that it can be used without an Internet connection!

 

 

Cheers

 

vonOben

 

 

[Herr Prop-Wasche]

Hey, Lothar--

 

Any chance you might be able to implement this in OFFbase?

 

After any mission in which any pilot whose Outlook/Attitude towards you is "Friend" is announced as captured or KIA, your pilot loses -5 points and rolls a die. If you roll a "1", roll another die to see if your pilot changes from his original class into one of the following:

 

1: Coward

2: Killer

3: Heavy Drinker

4: No Change

5: No Change

6: No Change

 

After three months, roll another die on the first of every month to see if you change back to your original character class. Rolling a 1 or a 2 means you change back, 3-6 means you stay the same until next month.

 

This might make for an interesting turn in events in an individual campaign, with the outlook and goodwill of other pilots changing as a result of your change in personality. Reflects the possible effects of the loss of a good friend in battle and why some veterans tended to avoid making friends with new pilots.

 

I don't know if it would be hard or easy to implement, but might be something to think about!

 

Cheers!

Edited November 3, 2011 by Herr Prop-Wasche

[Creaghorn]

good idea HPW,

 

i thought about something like this as well. for instance that if you are a schoolboy, then you might slowly turn into a charismatic leader. or at least be a grown old young man after months of battle, or become a drinker. but you won't be a schoolboy anymore after a while. of course if there are some changes, then only what's logical. a tyrann turning into a schoolboy wouldn't be too realistic. but maybe it should be also by own choice because to figure out what fits, who can turn into what, do i even want that to happen etc. wouldn't be easy to implement.

 

 

this mod is great so far. still need lot of phantasy of course, but alone the evolution from the first posted version couple days ago and latest version shows how much potential this has

[+Lothar of the Hill People]

Would it be acceptable to make the points-value of the various events/actions user adjustable, to suit different types of play? As it stands, those who fly with all aids available and with easy workshop settings might find that they gain prestige points very quickly for fast promotion, but those who don't will find they accumulate very slowly for very slow promotion rates. Those who navigate by paper maps, for example, rarely hit all the mission waypoints and therefore only rarely get a Mission Successfull outcome. Being able to adjust the point-value for each action would be a way of balancing the promotion rate for the different types of play.

One of the benefits of the OFFice suite is OFFbase could ultimately talk to OFFset to examine workshop and CFS3config settings, judge the difficulty, and scale automatically. That'd be quite a bit of work, so the next version will feature a simple user-adjustable rewards scale. First version will scale prestige from both missions and squadmate goodwill equally, not sure if there's a need to treat these separately at this point. Feedback from testing will be useful, I'm sure.

[+Lothar of the Hill People]

Any chance you might be able to implement this in OFFbase?

...

This might make for an interesting turn in events in an individual campaign, with the outlook and goodwill of other pilots changing as a result of your change in personality. Reflects the possible effects of the loss of a good friend in battle and why some veterans tended to avoid making friends with new pilots.

 

i thought about something like this as well. for instance that if you are a schoolboy, then you might slowly turn into a charismatic leader. or at least be a grown old young man after months of battle, or become a drinker. but you won't be a schoolboy anymore after a while. of course if there are some changes, then only what's logical. a tyrann turning into a schoolboy wouldn't be too realistic. but maybe it should be also by own choice because to figure out what fits, who can turn into what, do i even want that to happen etc. wouldn't be easy to implement.

 

Not sure how comfortable I'd be changing player pilot's personalities randomly, HPW, as Creaghorn makes a good point about choice. Maybe allow a choice of evolution along different paths at critical junctures? "Your friend is dead, do you go to the chapel to pray, to the mess for a drink, to your quarters to hide from the world, or to the hangar to clean your plane's guns?"

 

this mod is great so far. still need lot of phantasy of course, but alone the evolution from the first posted version couple days ago and latest version shows how much potential this has

 

Thanks! But I doubt I'll be able to keep up this pace of updates. Have real work to do! So getting feedback from you guys helps me put my effort in the right place.

[+Lothar of the Hill People]

Version 0.5.6 has been posted which fixes a couple of killer bugs as well as introduces a user-scalable prestige system.

[Herr Prop-Wasche]

Version 0.5.6 has been posted which fixes a couple of killer bugs as well as introduces a user-scalable prestige system.

Thanks for the update!

 

Not sure how comfortable I'd be changing player pilot's personalities randomly, HPW, as Creaghorn makes a good point about choice. Maybe allow a choice of evolution along different paths at critical junctures? "Your friend is dead, do you go to the chapel to pray, to the mess for a drink, to your quarters to hide from the world, or to the hangar to clean your plane's guns?"

I don't necessarily see it as random, since I was limiting it to three possible character classes: Killer, Coward, or Heavy Drinker, since to me, these logically extend from having one of your friends killed. And, without getting too philosophical about it, how much choice do people have in the type of personality they have, or what kind of character traits they may display under certain conditions. Maybe the death of a friend in war brings out a dormant character trait that you didn't even know existed? Finally, I wasn't thinking of this as a permanent change--just a temporary one as your pilot adjusts to the loss of a close personal friend.

 

Still, whatever you decide is okay with me, Lothar. OFFice is a fantastic addition to the OFF universe. With luck, maybe it can be included in P5 or P6?

[Creaghorn]

what's a bit funny that everytime i install a newer version, the guys in the squad who liked me, suddenly are my enemies, and the man of god suddenly turns into a tyrann etc. because the personality dice is thrown new again .

 

anyway, i like it more and more. that is something to look forward to when landing.

 

what also might be a necessary factor is the group feeling. ok, i'm good with x and good with y. which might indicate that x and y are good among themselves too. so you sooner or later have a group with whom you hang out instead of single persons. maybe a best friend potential with one or two, but slowly the people grow to a group. so maybe there might be encounters with groups, contentig of x, y , z etc. or if you are part of the group, you have a group-encounter with a newcomer (you're the new lad eh?), which is also qite realistic and common.

so you might also know who hangs out with whom without you beeing involved. that would add lot of immersion. a list of names as now, and additionally a list of groups where you can see who is involved in this group. you might sooner or later enter this group and make encounters as the group with others randomly or as a single person as before. wether by dice roll or by own choice.

the higher the morale of a squadron is, the fewer groups, and therefore more mates are involved in it. that's then really the band of brothers group. any newcomers are not involved in any group in the beginning.

if the morale is bad in a squadron, then you have many smaller groups, as it is in real life.

 

maybe even with a sort of exhaustion counter. for you or maybe even for all mates. the higher the exhaustion, the more often you fall into the direct opposite of the character you have during encounters. then it's time to take a leave, otherwise you'll keep the opposites characteristics more and more.

if someone dies, your exhaustion counter jumps up a point or so. if one of your "group" dies, then it jumps up 5 points. something like this. then you'll become a killer, drinker, whatever until taking leave. otherwise more or less keeping like that permanently if not doing something against it. if you then take leave or simply skip one or to days, then the counter slowly decreases again. after leave of course more. depending of the character the exhaustion rises slower than other. e.g. a priest can cope better with losses than a coward. a charismatic leader slower than a schoolboy etc.

 

what do you think? possible?

Edited November 4, 2011 by Creaghorn

[Bletchley]

Thank you Lothar, the user-scalable addition is going to be useful for me. I fly to British_eh's RSS rather than DiD, so I have scaled it back a bit - I will let you know how it works out :)

 

One recent observation/bit of feedback - I was shot down by ground fire whilst attacking a balloon, and captured, but OFFbase continued to regard me as ready for duty (as I was not dead). Not a big issue, as OFFbase permits only a very limited amount of interaction until a new mission is flown, but a little routine that is triggered by capture would be a good addition perhaps ? You could have a dialogue box triggered by the event, where the squadron is informed of your capture and a friend (if you have one) collects your possesions and drops them over the enemy airfield. My current pilot hasn't died yet, so I have not had a chance to see what happens then :) But this pilot did start by joining a rather depressed and disfunctional squadron (RCF 19) in the spring of 1917, and after crashing a Spad on landing the Adjutant told him that he was no longer wanted and should transfer to another squadron. The transfer process worked well.

 

Bletchley

[Bletchley]

Tips for OFFBase Interactions

 

These will be familiar to those who have played the old paper version, but are offered as guidance to those approaching the game for the first time. One word of caution, however, these notes are based on the paper version and Lothar has already made some changes to this that may change things substantially - so take it with a pinch of salt :)

 

1. An important feature to bear in mind is that interactions between mis-matched ranks are inherently risky - if you are a Sergeant Pilot and you have an encounter with a senior officer (Captain, or Major, say) the prestige oints that you gain from making a friend of them (and those that you would lose from making an enemy of them) are going to be very much higher than those gained or lost from an encounter with another Sergeant Pilot - and the effect is cumulative, as the prestige points will be added or taken away at the start of every day that this officer is still on the duty roster. Generally speaking, lower rankers have a hard time of it - the attitude of almost every pilot will matter to them, whereas higher-rankers can generally afford to be more distant and less friendly towards the lower ranks (a Captain or Major is not going to be hurt too much by being brusque or curt towards an NCO or junior officer, but the reverse is certainly not the case). As a lower-ranker, therefore, a catious approach to all encounters is advisable, at least until you have enough prestige points to be safe from an enforced transfer to another squadron (this will happen if your prestige falls below zero, when you will be called in to see the Adjutant and told that you are no longer a valued member of the squadron). It is better to choose encounters with those of a similar rank, when you get the choice, or with those who already like you, if you want to avoid large and possibly damaging fluctuations in prestige - on the other hand, consorting with the higher ranking officers might lead to faster promotion prospects....

 

2. When offered the choice to make an encounter riskier or safer - taking the 'risky' option will give you an immediate small boost to your overall prestige (just one or two points, and non-cumulative, but this might be important if you are close to zero), but will mean that the encounter is more likely to end unfavourably for you - the cumulative loss of prestige points from turning someone into an enemy will soon outweigh the temporary points benefit (unless your 'enemy' dies soon after the event). The option of 'playing it safe,, however, is even more dangerouse - although you might make a new friend this way (giving a cumulative points benefit) there is a very heavy immediate prestige loss - very unwise for any pilot at the start of their career! Generally speaking, the higher rankers are better off than the lower rankers when taking the 'risky' option (being curt or unfriendly) in encounters with lower-ranking pilots, and lower ranking pilots might sometimes feel it is worthwhile to 'play it safe' (i.e. polish their boots, bring them a nice cup of tea, tell them how fabulous they look in their new uniform) when encountering a high ranking officer that is likely to be around for a long time (some OFF pilots hang around for a long time, particularly the aces, but most are here today and gone tomorrow).

 

3. Check out your 'Personality' tab before your first encounter - this will tell you which personality types tyou should avoid, or be particularly cautious with, and which to seek out or play the 'risky' option with.

 

4. Whatever you do, fate can be unkind. If you have the misfortune to be asigned to a squadron with rotten morale, a bad landing field and abysmal accomodation, or you unintentionally make some high ranking enemies, just keep your bags packed and be prepared for that exit interview with the Adjutant :)

 

Bletchley

[+Lothar of the Hill People]

what's a bit funny that everytime i install a newer version, the guys in the squad who liked me, suddenly are my enemies, and the man of god suddenly turns into a tyrann etc. because the personality dice is thrown new again .

Hey Creaghorn, when you update just unzip the new version on top of your existing install, replacing existing files. You can keep your existing pilots and squadrons folders so they don't change their personalities!

 

what also might be a necessary factor is the group feeling. ok, i'm good with x and good with y. which might indicate that x and y are good among themselves too. so you sooner or later have a group with whom you hang out instead of single persons. maybe a best friend potential with one or two, but slowly the people grow to a group. so maybe there might be encounters with groups, contentig of x, y , z etc. or if you are part of the group, you have a group-encounter with a newcomer (you're the new lad eh?), which is also qite realistic and common.

so you might also know who hangs out with whom without you beeing involved. that would add lot of immersion. a list of names as now, and additionally a list of groups where you can see who is involved in this group. you might sooner or later enter this group and make encounters as the group with others randomly or as a single person as before. wether by dice roll or by own choice.

Network mapping would be a lot of work, especially with some of the relationship changes I've been working on. But if I do implement something along these lines it could be as who's sitting together at the mess.

 

maybe even with a sort of exhaustion counter. for you or maybe even for all mates. the higher the exhaustion, the more often you fall into the direct opposite of the character you have during encounters. then it's time to take a leave, otherwise you'll keep the opposites characteristics more and more.

if someone dies, your exhaustion counter jumps up a point or so. if one of your "group" dies, then it jumps up 5 points. something like this. then you'll become a killer, drinker, whatever until taking leave. otherwise more or less keeping like that permanently if not doing something against it. if you then take leave or simply skip one or to days, then the counter slowly decreases again. after leave of course more. depending of the character the exhaustion rises slower than other. e.g. a priest can cope better with losses than a coward. a charismatic leader slower than a schoolboy etc.

 

what do you think? possible?

Possible, but complex. Something that would incentivize leave for sure, especially as I've been thinking about having to pay prestige to take leave.

[+Lothar of the Hill People]

One recent observation/bit of feedback - I was shot down by ground fire whilst attacking a balloon, and captured, but OFFbase continued to regard me as ready for duty (as I was not dead). Not a big issue, as OFFbase permits only a very limited amount of interaction until a new mission is flown, but a little routine that is triggered by capture would be a good addition perhaps ? You could have a dialogue box triggered by the event, where the squadron is informed of your capture and a friend (if you have one) collects your possesions and drops them over the enemy airfield.

Haven't yet had a test pilot in a similar situation, Bletchley, but this would be a high-priority feature. What does it say for your status instead of "In Service"? Is it "Captured"? If I know the flag I can start building it in. Any other mission consequences are things I definitely want to have OFFbase respond to but I can't do a ton of testing myself, so keep letting me know!

 

My current pilot hasn't died yet, so I have not had a chance to see what happens then :) But this pilot did start by joining a rather depressed and disfunctional squadron (RCF 19) in the spring of 1917, and after crashing a Spad on landing the Adjutant told him that he was no longer wanted and should transfer to another squadron. The transfer process worked well.

Those are the kind of stories I wanted to hear creating OFFbase. Very glad the transfer process went smoothly, and thanks for the feedback.

[+Lothar of the Hill People]

Tips for OFFBase Interactions

 

These will be familiar to those who have played the old paper version, but are offered as guidance to those approaching the game for the first time. One word of caution, however, these notes are based on the paper version and Lothar has already made some changes to this that may change things substantially - so take it with a pinch of salt :)

Thanks so much Bletchley these are really useful tips. One way to easily summarize playing "safely" or "risky" is that it can offset the feelings of the other party. Playing it "very safe" overcomes someone's hatred of you, while playing it "very risky" no longer gives you the advantage of their friendship.

 

I'm putting the finishing touches on a new version that heavily enriches the range of interpersonal consequences from encounters. Essentially feelings need not be mutual. Ultimately I'd like to make encounters a bit more game theoretic--with different incentives for different personalities and ranks to cooperate by playing "safely" or defect by playing "risky".

 

This is going to take some balancing, so thanks you guys for testing this and giving feedback.

[+Lothar of the Hill People]

Version 0.5.7 has just been posted, a major update as far as social encounters.

 

New asymmetrical two-way relational system: your pilot remembers how well others behaved and performed in encounters, given their personalities. Feelings need not be mutual. For example, a Gambler may come out of a gambling encounter liking a Cash-Strapped pilot more, while the loser grows bitter. The Bully will learn who his favorite targets are, as the bullied nurse their hatred, except for sycophants who might come to enjoy it or cowards who learn to placate it. Playing it safe or risky has a bigger effect, as your performance in the encounter is graded independently. Also: pilots with no kills or claims will no longer argue over kills, while pilots of equal rank will no longer engage in rank-pulling or brownnosing. Numerous fixes including a crash bug with the non-player Hometown Comrade and Natural Enemy/Friend classes.

 

Gonna need your feedback on this guys, how do the encounters feel now?

 

Hopefully it'll be approved soon so you can go get it! At least now the previous version will remain there in the meantime.

[Bletchley]

Thanks for the new version, Lothar, your changes sound fascinating and a real improvement :)

 

Yes, when captured the status in OFFbase changes to 'Captured'

 

One thing I have noticed about the Offbase transfer process - when creating a new pilot in the squadron that you wish to transfer into, it has to be ths same name as the transferring pilot (not sure about the rank, but having the same name is important). The first time I tried it I didn't think this would be important, as I assumed the new pilot details would be overwritten (I called him 2nd Lt. Stolen Identity), but ended up with both this new pilot and the transferred pilot on the roster (transferred pilot flagged as Player). This created problems for the OFF Manager, as i guess it enlarged the roster, which periodically threw up error messages saying it was unable to update pilot roster, and no pilots from that point on were killed or injured or went on leave. It might be worth including in the Transfer instructions that the newly created pilot must have the same name as the transferred pilot :)

 

Bletchley

[Creaghorn]

Hey Creaghorn, when you update just unzip the new version on top of your existing install, replacing existing files. You can keep your existing pilots and squadrons folders so they don't change their personalities!

 

that means that with the new version i just replace everything besides the pilots and squadrons folder in OFFBASE? great. good to know that .

i created additionally an excel file with every AI pilot having an own block with his name, a random pic and free space to make notes about their personality, with updating it the more gets revealed over time.

then there are four main registers in the excel file. friendly, neutral, unfriendly, and casualty. and depending what happens with the pilot, i remove his block to the apropriate register.

[Kaische]

Hej Lothar, hej to all!

Thank you very much for your work to bring your OFFbase program to life! I have one problem though, when selecting "Duty room" from the Squadron HQ menu nothing happens-I expect that the OFF manager should start automatically, is that right? Any idea? To run your programs I had to enable Windows script host, but it starts now without problems...

[+Lothar of the Hill People]

Hej Lothar, hej to all!

Thank you very much for your work to bring your OFFbase program to life! I have one problem though, when selecting "Duty room" from the Squadron HQ menu nothing happens-I expect that the OFF manager should start automatically, is that right? Any idea? To run your programs I had to enable Windows script host, but it starts now without problems...

Hey Kaische, the duty room isn't functional yet, but it's where you'll be able to see a list of your fellow pilots. To fly your campaign missions, go to the Airfield.

 

One thing I have noticed about the Offbase transfer process - when creating a new pilot in the squadron that you wish to transfer into, it has to be ths same name as the transferring pilot (not sure about the rank, but having the same name is important). The first time I tried it I didn't think this would be important, as I assumed the new pilot details would be overwritten (I called him 2nd Lt. Stolen Identity), but ended up with both this new pilot and the transferred pilot on the roster (transferred pilot flagged as Player). This created problems for the OFF Manager, as i guess it enlarged the roster, which periodically threw up error messages saying it was unable to update pilot roster, and no pilots from that point on were killed or injured or went on leave. It might be worth including in the Transfer instructions that the newly created pilot must have the same name as the transferred pilot :)

It was working for me with different named pilots, but maybe I broke something. I'll take another look. The new pilot with a different name should just be another pilot on your roster, if you delete it in OFF it should continue as an NPC in your squad.