Wrench

posting from my wife's office ... been here ALL frakking day, backing up the HD (yanked from the machine, running through one of their laptops to a NEW 1TB external) so, I don't think I'm going to loose much of anyhthing but lots and lots of time in rebuilding the games/mods/etc when the new machine arrives in about 7 -10 days. Nice new XPS 9000. I think I"ll call it 'HAL' so, i'm probably not gonna be around much, due to NOT having a machine to hookup to the net. Expect LOTS of Win7 qeustions when I'm up and runningj .... thank for all the support my brothers (and sisters, if any out there). Be back soon!! wrench kevin stein

...and I recall there are some manufacurers to stay away from (like internal HDs, too) I just can't remember if its Western Digital or Seagate or who ever!!! Some reccomendations, please!! I'm looking for something in the 250-1tb range, price around 100-150 dollars TIA! wrench kevin stein

Well, the quick and dirty way would be just to change the existing runways/airfields. Unfortunately, retiling/retargeting isn't something I can get into for the forseeable (9-12 month) future. STill got Korea, and just started redoing Isreal 2 to make some fixes in tiling, and some targets clean up (for both WoI and SF2I), what with the Suez Expansion due out any week now....But it WOULD be nice to add Helwan, Al Manusra, etc. BTW, don't forget The Wall on that map is juuuuusssst east of Port Said, thereby eliminated the need for Isreali involvement. Then there's Indi-Pakistan, Panama, WW2 Euro (retarget and minimal retile)...and 4 or 5 others..... wrench kevin stein

My apologies ... sometimes I forget about the english-as-a-second (or third!) language. You can EDIT the tiles in any image manuipulation program -- that's the easy part. If you want to only REPLACE the existing stock ones with repaints; just repaint and drop into the terrain folder. If you want to ADD anything NEW to a terrain (new TODS for buildings and trees) new tiles, dry river beds, etc, that can ONLY be done in the TE, as it has to compile a new TFD file, which stores the information as to what tile goes where. If fiddling with mountains, valleys, etc, then it needs to compile a new HFD, which stores all the height field data (get it -- HFD!!<grin>) the praire is called "grass field" .. for some reason I took a cheaters way out. to change pre-existing trees, all you need to do is create the tga for the bush/tree/forest/whatever, and edit the terrains' data in to point to that tga....like so [Texture025] Filename=mountain1.BMP HasWater=0 Color=0.718371,0.605424,0.451735 SolidObjectTexture= AlphaObjectTexture=ter_newtrees1.TGA BUT ... without a NEW TOD, placing the trees when wanted, you'll be stuck with the stock placements (which be sorta sparse) wrench kevin stein

EDIT: hm.... looks like some retiling would be in order too, to add the 'historic' EAF airfields ala the Isreal 2 map (all them bases in the Nile Delta region). AGain, not a real big deal; just finding the proper coordinates would be the problem, and adding the various nearby cities and such. As the terrain uses the stock Desret textures, + the 'cityport2', that shouldn't pose any problems, either Just is case anyone is wondering .... when I do a WW2-ish terrain, I usually take into consideration WHAT would it take to bring it forward into more modern times. It kinda saves on brainwork....although sometimes the research is killer!! below are the entries for the TextureListDesert.ini for the cityport2 tile, for anyone who wants... first listing: Filename069=CityPort2.bmp later entry: [CityPort2.bmp] TextureType=1 DetailType=2 HeightMapScale=2.000000 TransitionType=2 TransitionTo=4 3WayTransitionTo=0 RiverType=0 RandomFactor=100 ExclusionRegion=0 ExcludeMaxX=0 ExcludeMinX=0 ExcludeMaxY=0 ExcludeMinY=0 LimitRotation=0 Allow0deg=0 Allow90deg=0 Allow180deg=0 Allow270deg=0 SolidObjectTexture=terobject_buildings1.bmp AlphaObjectTexture=terobject_trees1.bmp wrench kevin stein

Cocas: I don't suppose we could talk you into a proper Avia S-199??? What with the imment release of the Suez Expansion for SF2:I and WoI (to follow SF2 later). As TK is giving us Sptifires..... the only REAL problem I forsee is a proper FM for it.... The Gladiator looks GREAT!!! Have to dig out my Cull book on Malta, as it has all the serial numbers for the Hurri and Glads used there wrench kevin stein

Modernizing the NorthAfrica terrain would probably take about 1-2 days work; all you really need to do is remove my repainted runway skins, and swap out some of the Runway3s for either Runway2 or Runway1 (bigger for jets). Benghazi should have plenty of room for a Runway4 for their Badgers; same for Cario and Alex. Then, just do the rename thingy to more modern names (ie: remove "Landing Ground" and "Field") The docked ships/convoy stations, vehicles at the depots/army bases are just as easily swapped out for more modern stuff. Of course, SAM sites would need adding, but again, the only hard part is locating them (ie: copy/paste pre-existing target areas and populating with the necessary launchers, radars and whatnots). IIRC, I used the generic "AAA" for guns. If networked AAA guns are being used, you'll have to co-locate Firecans in the general vicinity of your AAA batteries. Swapping out the "3RFlag", "IT2Flg", etc for LYFlag and EGFlag would also be necessary. One could even get Greece into the action, what with the Athens INt'l existing; although the airfields on Crete would be problematic ... as they're the small Runway3 (and I don't think anything else would fit!!) One can change Crete's 'status' to NEUTRAL, and it'll be ignored. (no insult meant to Cretens, of course!) Nope, not hard to do at all. wrench kevin stein

Yes, I do it ALL the time. what kinda question is that?? Use Gerwin's extractor, pull apart the Desert.cat, convert the tgas (sea/sea-land transitions) to bmp, use the ancient Desert/SF terrain editor, drop the TFD/HFD into it and go. btw, ALL the tiles on ALL the terrains between 1stGen and NextGEns are 100% identical. So it makes absolutely NO difference where the tiles come from. So you can use Skypat's extractor on the SF desert cat, and do the same thing (ie: extract all, and just toss out everything but the terrrain inis and tiles)BTW: double check the inis, to make sure they're in ANSI, not unicode, as the TE only reads ANSI. again, easily added via the Terrain Editor; mind you, there ARE some tiles blatently missing (farmriverend.tga, desertrivermouths, in both right, left and center but those are also readily available if one knows where to look) would require manipulation of the height field. IE: exporting the height field as bitmap, importing to Photoshop or Gimp, and 'adjusting the surrounding height' to raise or lower it slightly to creat wadis or other dry drainage features (btw- a 1 pixel brush WILL create a gully/canyon 3-5 km across -- and that's the smallest possible - look on Fighter Bowl terrain I did -- the river vally north of the Saknuseum Sea was create EXACTLY that way, and is HUGE!! Grand Canyon/Valles Marinaris size) You also have to be REAL careful with the Desert1 and Desert2 tiles ... as 99.9% of the airbases SIT on those tiles, hence, they're not having any vegatation. One could, however, create a 'clone' of the Desret1.bmp, and call it .... oh, let's see.... "DesertAB.bmp" (which means doing a 'save as...' for the original tile, so's you don't loose it), then add it to the texturelist ini, and hand place it under the various airbase; of course, you'd need the Desert_Cities.lst for that too ... iirc, it comes with the TE; if not, they're not too difficult to recreate. I take you haven't see the America SouthWest map (aka: ASW). "Plains" tiles are all over that map. yup, like Fubs said ... been there done that 1000million times (if fact I was just doing it yesturday). You'd use 'tree2', as that's the shorter one. All done in the TE (see screenie below -- black objects are buildings, white objects are trees) and yes, that's a new-build, custom tile. wrench kevin stein

what he said.... wrench kevin stein

Happy Birthday!!! wrench kevin stein

Why not just use the cockpit (providing you're doing a VERY late model type), cockpit ini and avionics ini from the HAF F-4E AUP I released a coupla years ago? It uses the F-15 HUD tgas, the EJ-Kai cockpit (more glass-like) and all sorts of stuff I can't remember now....(btw, it's for 1st Gens at 08 level) It's a whole aircraft pak, AND has Sundowner skins (don't know if those'll work in SF2 yet ... but I'm sure Ant has that well in hand, knowing his passion for Rhinos....). But transfering the cockpit/cockpit bits and the inis over should be a fairly simple job wrench kevin stein

StationSpecificCode works in WoE/WoV/SF/SFG/WoI post-08 patch with no real problems. You DO have to add the lines to the aircraft's dataini (look at the stock Mig-23 -- it uses it) You can also do another trick for each/any particular station: NotAllowedWeapon= but you have to list EACH one you don't want to load (check out the Yak-25 Flashlight in my Yak Upgrade Pak) That'll prevent certain types from loading forever! Example, from the Flashlight: and OnlyAllowedWeapon= both work in 06/08; haven't tested in in SF2 yet, but I see no reason why it shouldn't work, as the basic core game engine is pretty much the same wrench kevin stein

I take you have the complete listing for TF16/17s CAs and DDs??? If not, I do. BTW, we ARE missing the Sims Class DDs (in their proper from). I just renamed the destroyer as used in the US formations to 'Sims Class DD' ... it really isn't even close to the proper size/shape/armaments/etc. Also, IIRC, the CAs are incorrect -- have to re-look that one up. Probably Portland Class, as opposed to the Brooklyns (it's just a simple matter of not having enough ship types ....) (also, anyone notice that the IJN DDs are called "Akakaze Class DD"??? Bonus points to ID it's origination) wrench kevin stein

Wellllll......don't most Hunters have "Sabrina" bulges!!! That is some SERIOUS detail!!! The wiring looms look almost real. The RWR trick looks vaguely familiar... wrench kevin stein

WOOT WOOT!!! Have a great day Ken!!! wrench kevin stein

Sure, you'd just need individual OBJECTS for each and every ship, add each and every one to the types ini, then add each and every one to their locations in the ship formations. OTC did/does something similiar for the USN blockade destroyers, and Soviet freighters. wrench kevin stein

DRA_IRM maybe??? I know that'll mount 2 'winders don't recall a dual AHM rack, but I remember creating a dual ARM rack for the F-105G using the BRU-57, but that was like 5 years ago... wrench kevin stein

PLEASE ALWAYS try to state WHICH version of the game(s) your talking about, in the first sentence if possible. It'll help narrow down the answer. Instead of having it at the end of the post, making it a bit more confusing. Have you checked the SF2 Knowledge Base? Some kind person addressed this very same problem just over a week ago (as there were like 2 or 3 threads on the subject in 3 day period..), and thoughtfully posted a tutorial on HOW to adjust start/end years for SF2 series games..... http://forum.combatace.com/topic/55030-adjusting-beginning-ending-years-for-sf2-series-terrains/ and it's not the 3/10 patch that's causing it (although it's screwed up s**tloads of other things..) ... it's how NextGens work now. wrench kevin stein

Baby, that is SOME detailing!!! NICE!! wrench kevin stein

No, all the Thud's used in Nam had the bombbay filled with a fuel tank. In fact, NONE of the 3rd Party Thuds (in particular AD's D/F/G) have the bombbay. It's an internal fool tank ...if you extract BOTH data inis for the stock 105s (this is SF2V), you'll their's are fool tanks too and no, you can't convert it to a working bay, as there's no doors cut in the fueselage meshes and no animations. wrench kevin stein

The typo definatly exists ... I just checked mine. Don't know if it was there before or was "Wrench Induced". You must have been using it in an 08 patched version, cause it never manifested for me. Oh, well, happens sometimes! Wouldn't it be easier, than tossing out an ENTIRE install, to simply EXTRACT the needed airfiled inis, and drop them into the Okinawa terrain folder? Probably be a LOT less work, but if you are on an 08 level, rebuilding a new one at 06 would most likely wind up as best wrench kevin stein

Nice to see the surprise Spits .... EAF should have Mk.V trops, IDF had both standard and LF model Mk.IXs. I just wonder if the EAF Meteor and Spits will have the correct serial numbers, as opposed to just reusing the stock ArabNum decals. (btw, accruate decals for both already exists ....) wrench kevin stein

Let you in on a little secret ... so far -now, I havent tested ALL the new aircraft (well, 3 of them), but ONE important Navy Jet and it's pit works just fine in Gen1 series (discoverd this recently, while cross testing it due to a strange 'freeze' in SF2KAW). Dels AD pit also works just fine in in Gen1 The terrain itself, and all the ground objects work just fine, thank you. In fact, the terrain ONLY needs commenting of 5 lines in the data ini to work with NO issues (since all the tiles are Gen1) So for those of us still working with Gen1s, you'll only miss out on 1 or 2 airplanes. IF two of these don't work correctly in, say WoE at 08 level, there STILL exists perfectly usable alternates made for Gen1. And even if this new 'important Navy jets' DIDN'T wrok in Gen1, it's a VERY simnple matter to use pre-existing skins for, and just reuse the decals created for it (albeit, on a later version of said jet), but easily re-done by folks that can 'think outside the box' wrench kevin stein

WHICH versions of the terrains??? Original versions, perhaps? ... since I've never gotten around to the Phillipines, and DEFINATLY would have caught that on the Okinawa Upgrade pak. Also REMEMBER to ONLY use 06 level airfield inis (you'll note that in MY upgrades for the WW2 terrain, that's stated in the readme, and the 6 airfiled inis are supplied....most of the time) wrench kevinstein

I would SOOOOO love to do that .... Warbirds is one of my all time favorite books!! Ther's the Amiens prison facilty on the WW2 map I could 'borrow'.... placing Rats As$ would be the hardest part ... airfields don't like being within 1 tile of the coast (causes water humping, but with Brain's and Baltika's 'height field' tuts, might be workable! Don't know if Turkey is there or is usable, due to "The Wall" for FoE ... but we got ALL the planes for both! hmmm....now you got me thinking ... use 2 river/sea ends for the small beach area between the mainland and the island,with the bridge over it, as described .... sea/desert 25/75s......hmm.... and I have an approximate idea as to 'where' on the Saudi coast it might go... runway1/5/6 are approx 1 tile in lenght....hmmmmmm.......some experimentation is in order, me thinks!!! (and be a hell of a lot better than flying the same 75 miles, like the ATF/FA versions... on the isreal/egypt map!!) wrench kevin stein