Mission 4 - Seriously?

So there I was... finally getting back to the Argo campaign. When I first played it, I always got a CTD in mission 3. After I got a new graphics card, that CTD was gone, but I never got around to flying the campaign again - until a few days ago. Besides a few woes with the cargo in mission 3, I enjoyed it quite a lot.

Now in mission 4, approaching Batumi, I just thought this looked absolutely fantastic and gorgeous.

Since it was getting dark, and obviously going against the briefing, I went to check if the NVGs provided better visibility. They didn't, and I switched them off. A minute later, my screen went black. What the heck? I was forced to end the mission, checked the debrief... 3 of 4 crew members just died for no apparent reason. What the hell?!

Ran the replay, took control before I had initially switched on the NVGs, and smoothly continued to the next turn somewhere in the mountains beyond Batumi. Switched on the NVGs to test a theory - yup, within a minute both pilots were dead.

Well, cool, if that's the way you want to treat players, please allow me to verbalize my deep discontent with this design decision.

What a glorious waste of my time, and who knows what the rest of the missions might bring in regards to "parenting" and punishing the players. Campaign uninstalled. Too bad, I had enjoyed it thus far.

To end on a positive note: Some campaign creators decide to count a mission as "successful" whenever the player lands back at base, regardless of how well things went along the missions. Personally, I tend to prefer this way of giving players a lot of leeway. It doesn't take away from a good mission, and may actually allow players to work around a bad one. If the Argo campaign were to be updated in this fashion, I would greatly appreciate it!

Of course nowadays we can just skip ahead to the next mission right from the campaign screen, but I found this "feature" in mission 4 so terribly disappointing that I'm really not looking forward to finding out what other questionable decisions await in the missions to come. (There goes the positive note... sorry.)

@Yurgon Somewhere in the briefings or docs, it's stated that NVGs are "currently" unavailable for some reason. That said the initial limited missions can easily be finished without them. It's "part of the story" so to speak. I do see your point though.
What's worse for me is that I can never finish the last mission, due to some bug that makes the helicopter slide off a roof and sets the building on fire. Stonesky had a similar issue in one of his missions, and his fix was to change or remove/re-add the same building and save the mission. But I can't do that myself. This is a really "old" campaign, and I guess it suffers from all the updates in DCS, while it's not alone in that department. Sometimes voice overs triggers prematurely etc. Hopefully it will be fixed/updated at some point, and the future state of the DCS core won't break cool campaigns.
Cheers!

Sent from my SM-A536B using Tapatalk

A perfect example of why I still keep 1.5.8 on my PC and occasionally fly missions and campaigns on it! Though I can't remember if this particular campaign was around then - there are definitely a few that are well bugged now but weren't then.

Argo needs a serious review. For instance, NVGs should be allowed in all missions until the searchlight is fixed, and most of all, the old carrier needs to be replaced by an updated model, because it's now gone. One of the last missions is rendered impossible due to this.

6 hours ago, MAXsenna said:

Somewhere in the briefings or docs, it's stated that NVGs are "currently" unavailable for some reason.

Yes, indeed. It's just that pilots don't usually die from using bad NVGs, and their crewmates most certainly wont. Even if the pilot flying was blinding himself, there's still the dude on the other seat who can take control at a moment's notice. It's all a matter of crew coordination and supporting one another, which we can't simulate in single player.

In single player, we also don't get a commendation for denying to fly a mission for the simple fact that it's a death trap and no aviator should be forced to fly under such circumstances. But the campaign does exactly that - it forces the player into an extremely dangerous scenario and then also denies the use of the best available tool to help them.

1 hour ago, Dragon1-1 said:

For instance, NVGs should be allowed in all missions until the searchlight is fixed

I would say NVGs should be allowed, period.

We're talking about flying in IMC in a non-IFR environment.

If this was about a navigation exercise in complete darkness, with an extremely accurate flight plan that should keep the aircraft clear of all obstacles when followed closely - that would be a cool challenge, and I believe this kind of flying was actually practiced by some armies during the cold war. Of course they'd mapped every single powerline and knew exactly what they were doing, and they were only doing so because in case of WW III (and in case it lasted more than 20 minutes) it would be absolutely vital to have this capability.

Sending a search and rescue helicopter (or is it a search & destroy mission? Not quite sure) into a mountainous region at nightfall with significant fog and a very generous "flight plan" that doesn't provide pilots with the required speeds and timings to be able to follow it with no visual references - that's a death trap. It's bad mission design. And I don't care if the helicopter has a working search light. This kind of flying just doesn't make any sense. Or rather... ordering pilots to do so should only be the case in absolutely extreme situations where the mission goal is more important than the crew. The briefing didn't indicate such circumstances. It sounded more like "Yeah the weather is bad, visibility is bad, it's mountainous terrain... we know, we know, you don't like it. Who cares, deal with it. Oh and BTW, if you use NVGs we'll shoot you in the back of your head". This is basically the 101 of bad mission design and is also the reason I don't care weather or not the search light used to work better before.

@Yurgon I don't disagree. I believe that particular "story line" makes both of you blind, and the pilots screams "I'm blind" or something when you go down. I've also read that it was easier in earlier version when dark was not so dark. @Johnny DioxinThe NVG thing is a mission design, not a bug, while @Dragon1-1 said it. It needs an update/complete rework, because it's quite enjoyable! I finished this particular mission with full lights 20 feet above the road with civil traffic on low. My main issue was borked AI gunners, but that's now fixed.

Other issues IIRC are not being able to call FARPs etc. to have them turn on the lights, and some of the ships won't lower the rails until you're on the deck. But that might be a core issue.  

@MAXsenna - I was referring to this:

Quote

What's worse for me is that I can never finish the last mission, due to some bug that makes the helicopter slide off a roof and sets the building on fire.

@MAXsenna - I was referring to this:
 

What's worse for me is that I can never finish the last mission, due to some bug that makes the helicopter slide off a roof and sets the building on fire.

vor 15 Stunden schrieb MAXsenna:

@Yurgon Somewhere in the briefings or docs, it's stated that NVGs are "currently" unavailable for some reason. That said the initial limited missions can easily be finished without them. It's "part of the story" so to speak. I do see your point though.
What's worse for me is that I can never finish the last mission, due to some bug that makes the helicopter slide off a roof and sets the building on fire. Stonesky had a similar issue in one of his missions, and his fix was to change or remove/re-add the same building and save the mission. But I can't do that myself. This is a really "old" campaign, and I guess it suffers from all the updates in DCS, while it's not alone in that department. Sometimes voice overs triggers prematurely etc. Hopefully it will be fixed/updated at some point, and the future state of the DCS core won't break cool campaigns.
Cheers!

Sent from my SM-A536B using Tapatalk
 

It obviously is "part of the story" , but the design decision to "kill" the pilots for "violating an order" is ridiculous at best.

Campaign missions are played single player vs the story, for the players enjoyment. There's no competition, no leaderboard, just the story and personal preference of the player.

I am sure if IRL every soldier not following exact orders died a minute later, a lot of wars would have ended a lot different.

As a customer that buys a campaign I like to be able to decide like an adult about things like invulnerability, unlimited ammo, labels, etc. though I tend to prefer realism.

Pop me a message, call me names, but leave the decision to me. 

It obviously is "part of the story" , but the design decision to "kill" the pilots for "violating an order" is ridiculous at best.
Campaign missions are played single player vs the story, for the players enjoyment. There's no competition, no leaderboard, just the story and personal preference of the player.
I am sure if IRL every soldier not following exact orders died a minute later, a lot of wars would have ended a lot different.
As a customer that buys a campaign I like to be able to decide like an adult about things like invulnerability, unlimited ammo, labels, etc. though I tend to prefer realism.
Pop me a message, call me names, but leave the decision to me.