Airfield sizes

[ashpolez]

Hi all. This may be the wrong place for this, but does anyone know if you can change the size of the airfields in the game. The aircraft in the game can be set for minimum base size. so for instance is it possible to set only one base in the game to large, so that only this base will allow the larger aircraft to operate from it during missions?

 

Thanks

 

Jools

[+Wrench]

Easily done in the terrain's targets ini. You simply swap one out for the the Large field (runway 4)

 

BUT...(you all knew that was coming)....

 

There has to be space for it somewhere; meaning the area around might need flattening, and in some cases the addition of the 'airfield exclusion zone' in the tiling. This is done in the Terrain Editor. caveat: This is ONLY true, if the area you're placing the Large Runway into is too small. Many of the airfield exclusion zones, in particular for the WW2 maps, are just big enough for the Medium Runways.

 

An example of adding Runway 4 (Large Runway) would be my Libya upgrade pak, wherein I added R4 to Tunis for it's international airport. There was a handy 'empty' zone I could place it in. Pretty close to it's Real Life ™ location. I got lucky there!

 

Airfileds run like this:

 

Large: Runway 4 (the 2 crossing runways)

 

Medium: Runway 1, 2, 5, 6

 

Small: Runway 3 (that dirt strip)

 

The length and widths of the various runways are in the airfield inis, located in the terrain cats (ie: GermanyCE.cat, Desert.cat, VietnamSEA.cat, IsrealME.cat) First Eagles probably does in in a similar way, but there is no physical model of the runway (ie: Runway3.lod), as it just a "open" grass field.

 

This is from the desert_airfield1.ini

 

[Runway001]

Heading=0

Offset=0,0

Length=2500 <--

Width=90 <---

TouchDownHead=0,918.5

TouchDownTail=0,-918.5

TakeOffHead=0,1300

TakeOffTail=0,-1300

 

You can see we have a 2500 meter long runway, that's 90 meters wide. But this does NOT include all the other goodies scattered around. (those little roads, barracks zones, parking areas, etc)

 

So, in the terrain editor, you have to set the target area size (picture it as a circle, with the exact center at the 0,0 point of the airbase) in the terrain's cities list. Which in many cases must be created from scratch, or rebuilt to add new or expanded target areas (ie: all are considered cities, including airfields)

 

example: from the China map I've revamping

 

[City037]

Name=Liangshan Field

TextureType=3

Randomness=0

PositionX=274.000000

PositionY=725.000000

Width=5.000000 <--

Height=5.000000<--

HasAirfield=TRUE <--

 

You can see the Width/Height are 5000 meters, or 5 KM. The "HasAirfield=" line tells the TE to flatten it, so things don't disappear into the ground (most important here in Califorina, what with earthquakes and liquifaction and all that )

BTW, that HasAirfield line come in real handy for The Factory Place, Truck Depots; anything that might use 'poured concrete slabs' as a "foundation". Makes them nice and smooth. Plays hell with hills and mountions, though.

 

So, to anwer the original question, YES is is possible. You can even change their heading, if you've enough room in the airfield zone to rotate the runway facing.

 

Wrench

kevin stein

[ashpolez]

Thanks Wrench

 

Never tried modding anything before so thanks for all the tips.

 

I''l probably be back in a while with a whole host of problems that i have created

 

Thanks again

 

Jools