Like the way this is shaping up text…
Just wondering if that crane will be drive able?
Stealth kill via crate lol or having to remove something blocking the tracks the HECU put there
Well, in Black Mesa (“We got hostiles!”), there is a part where a HECU runs under a container, but u cannot drop it on his head 
Would be great if u could drop it! (Maybe with an achievement! --> Flat-Out)
just a note the rpg grunt would not take the thunder of the one that shoots your tram as one shoot teh garg earlier.
I honestly didn’t noticed that on “Power Up”, but it’s true. In any case, you weren’t on a train, and the grunt launching the rocket at the garg is not very impacting or noticeable.
The two rocket scenes are both impacting (or at least are meant to be), but for different reasons. The feeling from the first one is “holy shit, this creature is strong enough to withstand an RPG”, and the second is “holy shit, these guys are so pissed at me they’re attacking me with an RPG”. The tram destruction scene does a better job of that than a sniper on a crane would.
Maybe the rocket at the garg scene is just meant to be. I really didn’t notice that until now. Well, it wasn’t impacting for me.
And the tram one didn’t impact me as I generally ditch the thing. both the RPG spots can be missed if the player, isn’t paying attention or plays differently so an RPG on the tower will not change the effect, and in fact can amplify it if done right.
I personally didn’t find it impactful at the Garg. Like others have said, I didn’t even notice it the first time (or 2nd, or 3rd…). All I saw was this giant blue thing with flaming hands just burning down the guys attempting to shoot it.
I actually just started a fresh BM run yesterday and just got up to that part after having read this. I saw it roughly this time, but it didnt have any impact on me.
The RPG grunt at the tram on my first run through was definitely a “wow” moment, because you’re riding a tram and you don’t expect them to pull out a rocket launcher on you to blow up your tram.
Subsequent runs obviously didn’t have the same effect since I knew to ditch the tram, but I think overall it definitely has a bigger impact scene wise and I guess ‘intro’ to the RPG.
We should leave that be, and I think Text is somewhere along those lines too in that he doesn’t want to steal the limelight from that moment.
Edit: So I just played through Power up and then On a Rail since I’m replaying BM. I’m not using the 2nd lot of maps that have a dead end (I’ll wait till those are finished), but I did use the first lot.
Has anyone else come across an invisible bullsquid in the cafeteria? It was on my first entrance, and as I ran towards the ‘end’, I ran into what seemed like a semi invisible wall. I took the crowbar out and ended up hitting something that made chicken sounds (aka - chickensquid), yet it was invisible and didn;t attack me or anything. Once it died, the body spawned. Anyone come across this?
Note: I started my game anew, it wasnt an old save, my files are installed correctly, everything else has been fine.
All NPCs on my maps (and most BM maps too, but it varies depending on the NPC and usage) start their life as “asleep (waiting for input)”. They are invisible (except for their weapon) and have no AI, until they are sent a “Wake” command via the I/O system. You can also use the Asleep (Waiting for PVS) are Asleep (Waiting for Threat) as their sleep state but I find waiting for input to be the most reliable and foolproof.
You’ve just stumbled across a Bullsquid who isn’t waking up when he’s meant to - I probably missed a spot the player can walk through when scripting him to wake up. This is a problem which has been reported before, I know to fix it and I know how to. One thing which might help me is if you tell me the path you took whilst getting to the Cafeteria, so I know where I missed the trigger.
Cheers.
This man speaks the truth. I’ll put a TOW Launcher Marine where he was in his HL1 equivalent area, and the Sniper roughly where he lived in HL1, and leave it at that. I don’t really feel the need to alter the balance of the chapter or the game overall anymore than I already have.
EDIT: Here’s a random thought which crossed my mind when I was working on the maps today - you come across a whole bunch of cargo trains in the trainyard - and you can go into some of the containers. How would you guys feel about one of the “top secret” containers having the model of the cage you find at the start of QE in it, containing a locked up Houndeye? Kinda a prelude and a hint towards the future chapters. Serves to further the message that they’ve been doing dodgy shit with Xenians since LONG before the disaster started. I think it’s a really cool idea but may potentially be very out of place/too story altering to implement. Very 50/50 about it. Let me know what you think.
I think it’s a pretty good idea. Although, as you said, it “may potentially be very out of place/too story altering to implement”, since it’ll break the need for the “Questionable Ethics” title a little. Nothing major, though. I support the idea.
EDIT: I was thinking and maybe the marines could have set you a trap. As soon as you enter the container, they close the doors behind you and the houndeyes awake. How you would get out of the container I really don’t know. The idea behind the trap is to foreshadow the “Apprehension” chapter, soon afterwards, and make the player feel like “well, things are tightening up for me”. This way, the player will not be sure if the houndeyes were caught in the cages by the marines or the facility. I’m aware that my idea may come against the chapter feeling. Just a thought.
I think that’s a cool idea to do that.
Great idea for the houndeye encounter.
I support both, but sounds like quit some work to properly implement.
Good point.
As much as I like Text’s and FelipeCaners idea, I think a subtle form of foreshadowing would work out better.
That’s what I was thinking.
I don’t think it’s a good point. The houndeyes were probably captured in Xen and brought back to Earth through portals. In QE, I don’t remember any reference for portals, just in “Lambda Core”. As stated at the end of LC, the survey teams probably used the technology created in the Teleportation Labs to go to Xen. Somehow, the xenians had to be brought to the QE labs (I don’t remember its name), and I’m convinced that BM’s Materials Transport and its containers are safe enough to do the job. Workers are just that: workers. I don’t think they were supposed to open the containers and look what’s inside. They had just to do what they were told to do.
But, yes, houndeyes and cages would spoil QE anyway.
I’m into it, but at the same time I don’t quite like it. The entire purpose of QE was discovering that we had Xenians on Earth long before Black Mesa. Some foreshadowing like a giant (empty) houndeye crate or maybe something more subtle an open crate of ‘posters’ with one partially unwrapped, just enough for an observant player to notice the alien biology diagrams printed on it (I like this one the most). I know you like to preserve the initial ‘thunder’, like the first RPG Attack on you, or the first time you see an LAV-25 firing at you. I feel being too obvious would steal most of QE’s thunder, so it’s a thin line.
Not only that, but I’m not sure lowly construction workers would have 1/10th the authorization required to move live aliens 
SPEAKING OF WORKERS! I don’t know if you’ve been watching Facepunch lately, but when I posted the idea of a worker and asked for some assistance, they sorta ran with it. So far they a worker based off the cut HL1 worker, and an office worker. Would post pics, but FP is down. I’ll get them when it comes back.
The houndeye shockwave could damage the container door and allow you to escape once you kill them. The bad part if you’re almost guaranteed to take damage from the Houndeye, then you’ll have to exit the container and take on the fire-team that trapped you in it. If you dare go into that container with less than half health, you’re pretty much screwed.
This is a good point too.
We’re talking about full-sized train cars though, if I’m not mistaken.
I’m not a fan of the Houndeye in a cage idea either. It leads one toward too many questions that would be too difficult to create answers for or make little sense when one starts to ponder where the Houndeye would have come from and why.
It’s pretty clear that the aliens weren’t able to transport to Earth on their own at all until after the resonance cascade so this only leaves the scenario where the Houndeye was being hauled around by the humans for some reason, but why? In Questionable Ethics the aliens were being transported from Xen directly into containment cells.
Some of them were then moved to various other rooms within that section of the base to be experimented on, which explains the Houndeye cages seen in a storage room, but still very much within that same section of the base. That whole section is supposed to be very secretive and information regarding what happens there is on a need to know basis. This means you would somehow have to answer the question of why that Houndeye was being transported away from the Questionable Ethics labs or the question of where the hell else did it come from and where was it going and for what purpose.
You should also consider that the Questionable Ethics labs were still well within the Black Mesa base and thus in a very secured location. Even if there were an alien security breach, there really wouldn’t be anywhere for them or it to escape to. The idea of a Houndeye being hauled around on a train out on the surface just doesn’t make sense when in juxtaposition to this fact.
TL;DR - No to the Houndeye
I do have an alternative suggestion along those same lines. I think it could be interesting to see (not touch or reach) a few H.E.V. suits and or a Long Jump Module inside the cargo crates instead.
Why? The scientists in the Lambda Core had been visiting Xen themselves prior to the resonance cascade happening and they would have needed this equipment. We know that the H.E.V. suits can be found all the way back in the Chapter 2: Anomalous Materials section as well as in the Lambda Core so it’s clear they were being shipped around in some fashion and thus could’ve logically came from an outside source before being put onto the Black Mesa Materials Transport system.
Now, I don’t think it’s ever actually stated that the hazard suits or the jump modules are actually developed at Black Mesa, but just to be on the safe side you could always put these crates near the freight tram or tug tram instead to imply that they were simply being transported within the facility and did not in fact come from elsewhere. Thoughts?
Doesn’t Apprehension already sort of “spoil QE”, considering that it subtly reveals the scientist’s prior knowledge of Xen by taking place in a makeshift area for containing Xen life that existed “a week ago”?
No, he says that in HL as well. And he says he was told it was hauled in from the Challenger deep, his implication that it’s an Alien is just him speculating.
There’s a big difference between that and Aliens in cages and on operating tables.
Yes to the HEV suits, no to the module. It’d have less of an impact in LC.
What about a couple crates labeled “Mark V Hazardous Environment Suit”?