Baltika

Yet another terrain WIP. One day. . . Top secret(!) USAF WMD facility. . . Heading on to the nearby Death Valley for some speed trials. . . Way down south near Mexico, NAF El Centro. . . Finally heading off for some well-earned shore leave, I'll have a pint and a shot, barman. . . Here's the whole shebang. . . Full-scale California, started way back when we were looking to fix the seamountains on Dave's original SCal terrain. Of course, since then, Wrench "The Machine" has churned out about three different and increasingly good versions of SCal, plus all the tons of other stuff he does. But I thought this may be of interest to terrain builders. TE and the sim engine can handle individual high-res terrain tiles right alongside low-res standard tiles. Scale your transitions right, and the whole thing fits together. Maybe we can't do photoreal terrain. . . but we can get close, in selected areas anyways. Tally-ho! Baltika Edit: Get the alpha release here:- http://www.megaupload.com/?d=W31945U2

Now that is something else. . . I am reaching for my Lynyrd Skynyrd tapes (yes, audiocassettes) as we speak. . . Where can we d/l this assasin, and where is the US Constitutional Crisis: Confederacy 2010 campaign to go with it??? What, there ain't such a campaign? Yet. . . Ya'll know the British Republic will provide military aid to its former colonies. . . And Eurofighter will seriously kick some Yankee F-22 ass (j/k )

I promise to finish something, someday. Resolution: Don't start any new stuff

Don't worry, what I call my "North Cape" is well ahead of this in terms of development, despite being started much later. California FS was basically languishing on my HD as I reckoned Wrench had it covered - hell, I built a campaign for Wrench's Scal after I had done all the stuff you see here. This just got dredged up from the vaults because wpnssgt's Red Flag thread struck a chord. I didn't want to hijack his thread, so I started this one to show what I had worked out could be done in TE. I've made the alpha available because this is near the bottom of the pile of a long list of terrain wips. Here's how they're stacked:- NZ: A few more runways to be placed/flattened/test-flown. Then targetisation But it is the most advanced. Ironically, my most recent full-fledged TE project, but it has had the benefit of all my earlier head-scratching. Kuril: Intended as a quick fix to showcase a fully transitioned tileset, based on Deuce's WoE repaint. As with all my stuff, I got carried away, it will ship with 3 campaigns for JASDF/USAF/USN/USMC vs USSR (& for 2010, Breakaway Eastern Russian Empire) North Cape: Really Finland, northern Sweden, northern Norway, Kola Peninsula & Sankt Petersburg environs. All the targetlist is done, bar Norway. 2010 air campaign is built, featuring all listed nations plus USN CVBG and RAF expeditionary force, working on ground war. Iceland: I really want to get the tileset done & released. It is well advanced, but tiling from scratch is darn hard work. If I have to make another &%$&£%^ transition tile. . . From then on, a mish-mash of stuff, including upgrading my British Isles beta to full release, and that insane Northern Europe from Iceland to Moscow and all points in between, right down to Kursk. Speaking of which, don't get me started on my WW2 stuff Personally, I blame Gepard for posting his tutorials to TE. But for that, I would have been happily churning out campaigns files for existing terrains

OT: Wrench, where do I get your Confederate Spit? What's it called, General Lee? Time to give those dashed Yankees a trouncing

Wrench, you hit the nail on the head. . . Never mind the darn UFOs, I want a Shado Space Interceptor for WoE (And a girl in a purple wig and silver miniskirt - better speak to the missus about that one )

Excellent, Cheers Russo

Great plan, Area 51 is on the map, so we are good to go. I seem to rememebr a beta UFO model floating around somewhere?

Hi Jel, Thanks very much for the prompt and detailed response. Lots of useful info there. I am very excited at the prospect of the new build, like many people I suspect Thanks for the offer of help. I am quite happy to wait for the new release and upgraded campaigns as that seems the best way forward. Cheers, Baltika

Hi Brain32, good to hear from you As you know, you got me started on all this tiling stuff, waaay back in the early days of my Iceland terrain, so I'm glad I could come up with something useful in return :yes: Cheers mate

Urgh. . . Took this for a spin out of interest (been a long time) and the first thing I find is a whacking great runway parked in the sea. First thing to do on d/l is to find the targetarea entry for NAS North Island and delete all the [Targetxxx] entries. Shucks, it's why it's an alpha release

Glad you got it working, looking forward to trying it out

Thanks for the interest, everyone. For Wrench and wpnssgt in particular, but really whoever fancies it, here is a link for the unsupported, as-is, no-money back, use-at-your-own-risk alpha release. No point in wasting CA bandwith on something which is in the very early stages of development, but as this is a long way down my list of WIPs, I can't see it being advanced much any time soon. What you get is a new terrain HFD build for full-scale California, with an enhanced version of the tileset which shipped with the old, original SCAL terrain (by Dave, Edward and others, I think). There is a full, expanded Texturelist.ini which may be of interest to terrain builders. There are also the early wip hi-res terrain tiles featured above, plus Alcatraz and Treasue Island, just for fun. There is a massively expanded targetlist, based on Wrench's SCAl upgrades. There are lots of runways, but there has been no, nil, nada terrain flattening, so select runway take offs at your own risk. Some work because they are in naturally flat areas. There are no sea .tga tiles for activated water effects, so don't waste a lot of time trying to get it to work, it ain't there. Such targetising as has been done is purely of the cut and paste variety, and is more or less entirely lifted from Wrench's upgrades. What there is, is a fully transitioned tileset. (Although I think salt flat can only transition to desert). Also, the tiling is completed on this version, I ain't gonna be moving the tiles around none. They are where they are gonna be (unless there are glaring individual tile errors to be fixed). There is a working frontline, and a working movement.ini for all the usual mission types. So, it is flyable, for a bit of fun and sightseeing. Any feedback, comments, requests greatly appreciated. My to-do list on this terrain is:- Airfield flattening, final runway placement and headings to be set; Completion of .tga tiles for water textures; Creation of .TOD tiles for skyscrapers, trees, bushes, farm buildings etc etc; Photoreal NAS North Island, plus a few others of note (Area 51, oh yeah ); Creation of custom airfield.ini files for the photoreal runways, plus maybe some basic runway textures so they don't look so blurry when you're sitting on them; Terrain targetisation (aargh!). PLus no doubt various bits and pieces I cant think of right now. But, as I say, this one is a long way down the list. My NZ terrain is closest to "official" release, and that Iceland terrain tileset is something I dearly want to finish and release. Kuril islands and North Cape are close behind NZ. Then there is all that WW2 stuff. So this one is really just for fun right now. Cheers all, Baltika Link to alpha release:- http://www.megaupload.com/?d=W31945U2

I must admit, it was reading your Top Gun/Red Flag thread that prompted me to post these screenies. Really, the ground covered here is more or less the same as that in Wrench's SCal upgrades. ATM, my targets.ini is set up the same way, positing a "Global Sedition" invasion and occupation of SCal itself, but it would be easy enough to change the Aligments for full US occupation of the US. If you like, I can send the alpha over to you "as is" for a nose around, maybe with a view to developing this for general release. Likewise, @Wrench

Thanks for the comments, all Wrench, praise indeed, cheers mate. The baseline was original Scal terrain, plus the enhanced targetlist scavenged from your SCal upgrades. The tileset is a mix of that one (by Edward?) plus a stack more transition tiles based on that set (my favourite bugbear, not enough transition tiles in the stock sets). From that I created an entirely new .HFD in TE, stretched to full-scale in gimp. The pale sand/salt lake tiles are whipped up by me, from Google Earth colouring of Death Valley and the surrounding area, as is the salt flat airstrip (just a standard airbase ini file plonked on top). All the hi-res stuff is Google Earth imagery, cut, pasted, painted over a bit to blend in. I have improved El Centro tiles with the colour saturation matched to the surrounding fields a bit better, but no time to take a snapshot. As for the Tatooine-style moisture evaporators, they are again Google Earth images of the North Nevada Nuclear Test Facility, whatever those stacks/piles/bunkers are, blended in to my desert tiles. I suspect they blew up a lot of warheads underneath them in the 50s or something. What I would like to know is, how to make a HM .bmp file to give them the proper pointy shape? As for placement, it's a combination of GE, msn atlas, and my ever-trusty Phillips Universal Atlas of the World. And far too much time squinting at the screen when I should be actually finishing a terrain project or two As for status, this is at alpha stage only, no airfield flattening or target placement done at all, other than some airfields of the cut n paste variety. Also, although the core tileset is completed, I have not made up the .tga files, so no water effects (yet). And the hi-res runways are workable, but really blurry down low. They only look good from altitude. Call it more of a proof-of-concept. But, as with all my stuff, I'll keep plodding away with it as and when time permits, and when the mood takes me. Cheers all, Baltika

Great work Veltro, I must say I am really looking forward to this one

WoE, WoV, SFP1/SFG, FE. Don't have WoI, haven't taken the plunge into SF2 series, yet. (Waiting new rig, then, the whole lot, from the start )

Attention WW2 Propheads Thanks to all of you who have d/l BoB Campaign As stated, it is a WIP, so feedback is very welcome - I know it is not perfect, and I would like to make it better. Please post any comments, suggestions, bug reports, gripes etc here. (Except issues about the fact that the only bombers you can shoot down are Do-17Z. I also have that problem. Every time I take on a flight of Ju-88 or He-111 I get my ass handed to me. Even if I take my whole squadron with me, and maneouvre for a frontal attack on intercept, I get shot to pieces. If anyone has successfully intercepted such a flight, and shot down more than one bomber, please let me know how you did it ) I will kick this off by asking one question. In the readme, I say there is a big issue - RAF air units showing up in North West France, and Luftwaffe units scrunching up in a line between Paris and Calais. Has anyone actually seen this happen? Since I set this up again for public release, I have been flying the campaign, and I have not had it happen. It was perhaps, as TK suggested in this thread, a problem with my install. If it is sorted, I will amend the "Known Issues" accordingly. Thanks for your attention. Thread link: http://bbs.thirdwire.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=4037 Cheers, baltika

Hmmm. . . One more thing, try changing the NormalMissionRateDeviation= and OffensiveMissionRateDeviation= values to 0. I think these should be set to a number smaller than the number you have entered in the NormalMissionRate= and OffensiveMissionRate= flags. Otherwise, you could end up with a NormalMissionRate or OffensiveMissionRate of 0, or even less than 0 (a negative value) and that might cause the game to choke. Scratching my head now

Just a few suggestions:- 1. What are the alignments of "SOVIET" and "Afghanistan" in your NATIONS.INI? You may want to match the alignments under your [FORCE001] and [FORCE002] entries. 2. Double check spellings of BaseArea= flags. That sort of error was my most common source of CTD in campaign building - you set an air or ground unit to an airbase/targetarea/strategic node which does not exist in the targets.ini (or, for nodes, defined in the campaign_data.ini. 3. I see you have BaseArea=Bagram under [FORCE001] but your strategic nodes have it defined as [strategicNode001] BaseArea=Bagram Airbase. Change the strategic node to BaseArea=Bagram. The campaign engine seems to treat airfields differently from non-airfield target areas, and I have found it is better NOT to use airfield targetareas as strategic nodes. 4. Maybe the engine is choking because there are no afghan air units. I appreciate this is historically correct, but maybe the game engine needs an enemy air force? 5. Frontline. I have found this the most troublesome part of campaign building. I seem to remember TK posting over on the TW boards that the frontline needs to extend all the way from one side of the map to the other (either horizontally or vertically). I have also found that the more points there are on the frontline, the better the game seems to cope. Good luck! Cheers, Baltika

Sure thing, I will continue to post updates as and when they are completed. Cheers, Baltika

Hi Dave, I would consider it a great honour if my little terrain project were to be included in the mighty NF series. In fact, I have been reading up on 57th FIS, the Iceland Defence Force, Operation Nordic Shield, and of course, the Soviet Operation Polar Glory, with a view to writing up a couple of campaigns to go with the terrain. Having said that, the problem is the "To do" list. - Transition tiles are almost complete, I only have about 24 (!) still to make. - I have to make all the necessary sea tile .tga files (36 at present count, plus some new ones to come) - There are only 6 working airfields in my current build, none are flattened/tiled properly yet. There are a stack more to place, flatten, and test-drive. - There are no target areas created to speak of (some waypoints, that's all) - No terrain targetisation work has been done at all. I am wanting to finish the tileset first, so I can place my targets on a completed terrain. - No .TOD file work done yet. Admittedly not much required, given the lack of forests on Iceland, but I want to have a few buildings/trees on the farm tiles, and buildings on my coastal town tiles. - No real city tiles created, or obviously any city transition tiles. Only really an issue for Reykjavik, but, that is a whole new tile type to be added. I am not Brain32, and I just can't get the Icelandic city tiles I do have to look like anything other than bits of cities cut & pasted from Google Earth, with obvious "seams" at each tile edge. - Lots of seam work to be done on existing tile types. Up close, you can see the joins. My skilfully taken WIP screenies tend to hide this effect Prognosis:- I have made leaps and bounds since my original, now somewhat embarrassingly amateurish v0.1 beta I posted up here many, many months ago. But development time on this is running into years already, with still plenty to be done. And, as I am extremely happy to report, there are now 2 mini-Baltikas running around, my daughter aged 2 yrs 6 months and son aged 3 months. As you know, that limits the gaming/modding/beer drinking time just a bit Not that I would have it any other way. So, the upshot is I just don't have a realistic timescale for completion. But, I am certainly open to suggestion on how to take this forward at more of an increased pace. At your service, sir

Hi there, TK is on record as saying that the SF2/SF2:V/SF2:E/and SF2:I series are simply updated versions of the SFP1/WoV/WoE/WoI series, with native compatibility for Vista, upgraded cockpits, improved 3d models, improved shader support etc etc. Also, the SF2 series have an improved file structure which make modding a whole lot simpler. Add to that, that patch support/updates/new releases are geared towards the SF2 series, there is really no contest. So, SF2 series is the way to go. The makers of the Desert Storm mod have said it will be updated for SF2 series, same thing with a lot of existing mods. It may take a little time, but most folks will update their stuff for SF2 sooner or later. Welcome aboard, have fun

Thanks for suggestions How could I forget bobrock's superlative AV-8Bplus It is in now NP to throw in an F-22 squadron for the Raptor junkies, or an F-35 for that matter. I realise I have missed out a few Red side planes, SU-33, Yak-141 Freestyle, SU-39. They can go into the mix too. "Blue" Russian units are en route. . .

Broken my intentions already. Progress update:- Campaign Files (Air War only) completed. Here's the backstory:- Kamchatka Peninsula, Far East, 2010 The discovery of a vast oilfield in the Sea of Okhotsk brings the promise of great wealth and prosperity to this remote region. The largely non-Russian population is vocal in pressing for independence. These claims are flatly denied by the Kremlin, which refuses to allow the disintegration of the Russian Federation and the loss of the massive mineral wealth and strategic importance of the area. The situation is brought to crisis point when the Far East Military District Generals unilaterally declare independence from Moscow, and claim sovereignty over the Eastern Russian Empire. With military resources stretched to breaking point, and having suffered the mutiny of the entire Eastern Command, Moscow thinks the unthinkable and seeks United States military assistance in stabilising the region. America is reluctant to be drawn into a bloody Russian civil war, but when Japan takes advantage of the situation by occupying the long-disputed southern Kuril Islands, the Eastern Russian Generals order an all-out offensive to maintain the borders of their new Empire. With the blessing of the UN and Moscow, the President orders USFJ Command to protect civilian lives, destroy enemy air assets, and comply with treaty obligations by assisting in the defence of Japan. . . Air war features all USN (CVW-5), USAF (44th & 67th FS (F-15C); 13th & 14th FS (F-16C Blk 50)), and USMC (VMFA(AW)-242 "Bats") units stationed in the area. All JASDF units are flyable. Red Side consists of the air units of: 11th VVS & PVO Army (Far East Military District), flying SU-24M, SU-35 (too good to miss out), MiG-31M, SU-27; the Russian Naval Aviation Units of Pacific Ocean Fleet, flying TU-22K and TU-95M (as stand-ins for TU-22M3 and TU-142), plus 387 IAP flying TMF's MiG-29C_rus. Still to be done:- Airfield flattening and alignment Adding selected air units of 14th VVS & PVO Army (Siberian Military District) Adding ground war Basic terrain targetisation (sorry Wrench, this won't be pretty, but it will work) Fine-tuning front line for disputed Southern Kuril Islands Adding terrain_movement routes for all mission types Adding more Russian airbases on Sakhalin Adding more Japanese cities Adding Naval Bases for all forces What won't make the first cut:- Anything to do with China, North or South Korea. Sorry, but I had to draw the line there as I want to keep this manageable on a short timescale. Cheers for now, Baltika