A moving, shooting Tug Boat in FE2!

[+quack74 329]

So check this out! I have a bunch of ships from SFP1 downloads in my GroundObjects folder to place as stationary targets (because I though FE doesnt support ships). Well, just before, I was messing around with some Config files (un related to Shipping) and figured I would try the game to see what the changes have made. I ran an Armed-Recon single mission using the Flanders terrain with Jan Tumas tiles and it started all glitched up! The planes all froze and exploded in the air and the first ground object I came to was a Navy Tug boat! It was moving! And it had a wake behind it! AND it was shooting at a truck! Yes the boat was sailing away on land! But it worked and kept sailing on leaving a white wake in its path.

I restarted my FE2 and ran it again and it was back to normal.

 

What was that all about?!?! Does Shipping work in FE2???? How did I have all the right effects working for that Tug? (would have been nice if it were in the water though)

 

 

[+ojcar 157]

Captain Francesco Schettino is commanding the ship!

[+quack74 329]

So I've been messing around a bit more. If I set the aircrafts "PrimaryRoles=ANTI_SHIP" in it's data.ini and in the campaigns DATA.INI I get Anti-Ship missions. The boat shows and is targeted. The boat is moving mind you with the proper wake behind it. The problem is my waypoint and the ship are always in the bottom left corner of the map. The planes hit an invisible wall and then the ship pops up for a bit and stops.

 

I tried different parameters in the Flanders_Movement.INI for shipping lanes

 

Just an example

 

[Route001]

RouteType=SHIPPING

StartArea=Dunkirk

EndArea=Nieuport

RoutePosition[001]=117978,149445

RoutePosition[002]=132071,150226

 

Nothing changes. I guess the problem is the "MOVEMENT" parameters arent functional. Everything seems to work except for the ships' position in an ANTI_SHIP mission.

 

Anyone know of a way around this? Or has the programing been total deleted from FE2 brain?

 

 

[Wrench 9,883]

there's no blooody water on that map!!! (and yes, we've been fighting with ships on land since SF1 first came out!)

 

for grins and giggles, try it on the ww1 palestine map; it already has shipping routes set up.

 

the reason the wake is showing, is the "ShipWakeEffect" is still in the (whatever) cat TK built it from in SF.

 

I've been getting that 'off in the lower corner bit' on the Ww2 New Guinea map too. Don't know what's causing it ... btw, the lower left corner of ALL terrains is the 000000,000000 point

 

 

I LIKE that floatplane!!!

 

 

edit: looking that flanders planning map (I have new ones from gerwin's tfd tool, btw), you may have to 'bend the route arund the land. unless its a straight shot, like dover to calis, you may need more than 2 'waypoints'

 

easiest way to plot, is use the WoVsqmd, and plot by hand. I have one set up for FE2, and have attached it.

just unzip, and drop the FE2Sqmd folder into your Fe2 mods folder. Click the exe, navaigate to the terrain folder and ONLY use the #1 planning map (the smallest). YOu can zoom in quite a bit. It's what I use to plot movement route (most of the time!)

 

also, here's an apporx position for Dover; maybe try a cross channel --- but I set my end point at LEAST 2 tiles width off the coast lines

 

Dover--

68938,165954

Edited March 1, 2013 by Wrench

[+quack74 329]

If the ships appear at 000000,000000 then the Terrain's "MOVEMENT" must not be functional. Oh well

 

The plane is an Albatros W.IV in the works by Stephen1918. Very cool to have. Lands and takes off from water too. But no water wake effect yet. (if possible)

 

I use KMD for all the coordinates in my terrains. It's all its good for these days. I'll try the palestine terrain tonight

 

Thanks Wrench

[Wrench 9,883]

i wonder if FE requires the terrain _water.bmp, that stated coming out with SF2I???? .... I can't see that I would. The terrain engine, i;m sure hasn't bee updated to that level, as the 'original' terrains don't have oceans.

[+quack74 329]

FEG and FEG have water in their terrains that are animated. The Flanders terrain has most of the Channel in it. Normal.bmp's for Water are in all the terrains. If thats what you mean by the terrain_Water.bmp.

[+quack74 329]

Check it out Wrench! I used the SF mission builder for this shot. Ships do work in mission building!

 

[Wrench 9,883]

roh SWEEET!!!!!

 

what I mean, is a specific image that tells the game engine 'heres water and here's land'...

 

like below...

 

red is water, black is land. and!!!... in SF2NA, there are 'zones' in to different greens that allow for aircraft carrier opertaions

Edited March 1, 2013 by Wrench

[+quack74 329]

Oh......No we dont have that. TW isnt upgrading FE anymore so we didnt get that last version. FE wasnt really made for shipping.

[+Stephen1918 1,474]

FE seems to have most of the naval stuff in it, including the ship wake and several bombs hitting water effects. There's a ship convoy formation in the Formations.ini, and a Naval Object in the Object List.ini.

I've been playing with the Flanders terrain, which has a lot of water in it. I've noticed that when machine gun bullets hit water there's a different effect than when they hit land. And when a plane crashes in water there's an oil slick. So FE "knows" the difference between land and water at some level.

I've managed to get ships moving on water by identifying them as "Transport" in the data.ini and setting up a truck route on the water. I can set up a Shipping route, but I haven't been able to get a ship to use it. (Things show up at 0,0 because the game gets the LOD, but doesn't know where on the map to place it. That also happens if you get the Position numbers wrong.)

In SF, how are the ships that follow the movement identified?

 

I've also been playing with the Albatros, I would love to have a wake effect when it takes off and land. Has anyone managed to do something like that in SF? I've heard that the original FE1 had a dust effect when the plane landed, does anyone know how that was done? What was the effect called and where in the data.ini was it placed?

[Wrench 9,883]

they set up pretty much the same as Truck_Route or Ground_Attack, with the exception of the name (this one's for New Guinea)

 

[Route011]

RouteType=SHIPPING

StartArea=Finschhafen

EndArea=Arawe

RoutePosition[001]=637000,380000

RoutePosition[002]=661000,395000

 

any 'vehicle' with a defined GroundObjectRole= of "Cargo_Ship" * (now, we're talking SF here), will show up, fairly randomly, in/on the shipping lanes.

they also have to have 'start and end points' of the same side (Blue-to-Blue, Red-to-Red)

 

as to effects, there's a 'waterhit' and 'dirthit' effect; prolly carried over from SF, just like the crashed aircraft old slick.

 

* transport is for trucks or tweeked APCs. using that MAY cause the Elric 'ships that sail over land and sea' phenomena

Edited March 3, 2013 by Wrench

[+Stephen1918 1,474]

Thanks for your help Wrench.

 

It looks like FE does not recognize a "shipping" route. If I define a ship as "Cargo_Shop" it will show up on a truck route, but the game ignores it if I make the same route into a shipping route. I'll keep playing with it.

[Wrench 9,883]

DAMN!!!

 

well, at worst you can do like we used to for WW2 stuff .. just stick a "convoy" of cargoships in a spot on the ocean. They should show up in STRIKE missions

 

this is a 'channel convoy' set up from WW2 Euro map (coordinates are flanders terrain. Obviously, you'll have to change all the ships , and perhaps add a new location in the movement.ini for the English channel

 

[TargetArea***]

Name=British Channel Shipping

Position=63257,138436

Radius=3000

ActiveYear=0

Location=1

Alignment=FRIENDLY

Target[001].Type=Oiler

Target[001].Offset=0,0

Target[001].Heading=90

Target[002].Type=USNCargoShip

Target[002].Offset=250,350

Target[002].Heading=90

Target[003].Type=USNCargoShip

Target[003].Offset=-250,350

Target[003].Heading=90

Target[004].Type=USNCargoShip

Target[004].Offset=250,0

Target[004].Heading=90

Target[005].Type=USNCargoShip

Target[005].Offset=-250,0

Target[005].Heading=90

Target[006].Type=USNCargoShip

Target[006].Offset=250,350

Target[006].Heading=90

Target[007].Type=USNCargoShip

Target[007].Offset=-250,350

Target[007].Heading=90

Target[008].Type=Tribal

Target[008].Offset=0,1050

Target[008].Heading=90

Target[009].Type=Tribal

Target[009].Offset=0,-1050

Target[009].Heading=90

Target[010].Type=Tribal

Target[010].Offset=-750,0

Target[010].Heading=90

Target[011].Type=Tribal

Target[011].Offset=750,0

Target[011].Heading=90

Target[012].Type=USNCargoShip

Target[012].Offset=250,-350

Target[012].Heading=90

Target[013].Type=USNCargoShip

Target[013].Offset=-250,-350

Target[013].Heading=90

 

here's the location (use same setup as bove) for a German convoy

 

[TargetArea***]

Name=German North Sea Shipping

Position=145361,182879

Radius=3000

ActiveYear=0

Location=2

Alignment=ENEMY

 

something to experiment with, at least

[+Stephen1918 1,474]

Thanks for the convoy set up. I'll use that for now. It's frustrating that some things carried over from SF, but other things didn't...

[+quack74 329]

Ok, I just did a Campaign mission (not single mission) with the AlbatrosW4 (soon to be released by Stephen1918). I set all the parameters for the W4 to PrimaryRole=Anti_Shipping in its data.ini and the parameters in campaign's data.ini for the W4 say Anti_Shipping=100

 

the mission called for an attack on enemy shipping lane near Dunkirk. Dunkirk is a Shipping route I have set in the Flander's Terrain's Movement.INI.

 

Sure enough I got to Dunkirk and there was the ship! Right were it's supposed to be! Actually in the water not land. Granted it was just a trawler, but none the less it was there! And it was the primary target. So the "Movement".INI in the Terrains' folder must work. Maybe at random? Not sure. But it does work sometimes. This is pretty good. Shipping just might be possible in FE.

 

Look at the pic. The boat is there, it's the main target, and it's in the water, and I dropped a couple of bombs on it and it actually sank!

 

-------- Ok, it only works sometimes. It randomly places ships to the lower left corner of map. Not following the "Movement" parameters all the time.

 

 

Edited March 9, 2013 by quack74

[+whiteknight06604 935]

that is an interesting development. now we need to con somone into making a propper WWI era cargoship.

[+quack74 329]

Well so far it still produces shipping lanes, at random, to the bottom left corner of the map which is 000000.000000 coordinates. The sim seems to be looking for the coordinates in the Movement.INI but just isnt making the connection. I think I've done all I can with the .INI's we have available to us. It's all in the programing. Maybe one day TK will add a patch for FE. A much needed patch to fix this and other annoying bugs.

[+whiteknight06604 935]

damn....... well you guys gave it a try.

[+gterl 1,214]

...just digging this one out.

 

Question/Situation:

- I'm having ships in the objects-folder (out of the North-Sea terrain)

- Ship's show up (randomly) on my movements.ini truck routes ....of course on land, like on the first pic in the first post

 

--> Is there any fix for this?

--> Do I have to modify the ships within the objects folder and make them 'static' and move them into my respective terrain folder? Is that the only solution?

 

thx in advance

[+quack74 329]

The code for "SHIPPING" was never fixed for FE1 or FE2. So there seems to be a random glitch that screws up the shipping routes in the "Movement.ini". Thirdwire has no plans to fix this for FE. So we can only place ships as static objects.

[+Stephen1918 1,474]

My ships in the North Sea Terrain had a wake effect and a smoke effect to make them look like they are moving when they're standing still. Installation instructions are in the ReadMe. Also, in the data file for each ship, make sure the GroundObjectRole is NOT set to Transport, Shipping, or Tank. Otherwise the game will use them in the Movements. If you set it to something like Bridge, Factory, or Warehouse, the ship should still show up as a target in the single missions.