orsin

this usually happens when the game runs out of its set memory range. The memory range here is not referring to the limit of windows or system memory. rather it is a range around 3-4GB. I noticed this happens a lot when certain weapon/ground unit use ultra high resolution texture. I used the exclusion method to pin down and discovered this to be the root cause. It is proven that when I reduce the resolution of the texture thus reduce the memory of those weapons, the crash is gone. So, when you see the crash happens intermittently, it is highly possible this is the cause. SF2 loads random ground unit and aircraft weapons for AI jets. When the program loads the weapon that has a memory requirement that exceed the allowed memory, this happens. The simple way is to examine the resolution of your weapons and ground object folder and resize those excessive resolution textures. It is completely unnecessary to use 4096x4096 texture on a bomb. 512 x512 is enough.

Honeyfox and i found this issue 10+ years ago and that was why he put his time to code the missile range simulator. The tool is very much a SF1 level simulation (which altitude effect is not gradual) It still works on SF2 and can get a close enough result though. In general all stock missile range have problem. Start with those AA missiles.

You can do this easily step1: move you mod folder to other drive. step2: you will need to run a windows command to make a directory link from C:\Users\your user account here\Saved Games. The command is as the following mklink /J Your_shortcut_Name Your_Mod_Folder_Path For example, your mod folder is the one called "Thirdwire" under the "Saved Games" folder. You moved the "Thirdwire" folder to your drive D:\ Then you need to create a linked folder still named "Thirdwire" under your Saved Games folder, which points to your moved folder that have a new path now D:\Thirdwire Then the command is mklink /J C:\Users\your user account here\Saved Games\Thirdwire D:\Thirdwire

it is not going to be any easy journey down this road. For someone who has explored the raw code, you will quickly noticed most of the DLLs and EXEs are shelled. and they are shelled using a propriatary program probably held by 3W...

A video showing improved dogfight AI for modern era planes, new chaff/flare effect and overall effect/texture resolution balance of the WOI Plus 3 mod.

Test of improved dogfight AI

a video to show - aircraft fire and explosion effect, - new tracer effect, - view point mod, - Kamchatka crash issue fix, - Dogfight AI adjustment and overall data overhaul and texture resolution alignment (that we aligned thousands to make them on the similar crisp/blur level) For Strike Fighters 2. This mod is yet to be released. This video is recorded in the "auto play" mode with no player involved.

a video to show - new flak effect, - new chaff effect, - new flare drag effect, - ground gun precision effect, - aircraft fire and explosion effect, - ship countermeasure effect, - city night light effect, - new tracer effect, - view point mod, - Kamchatka crash issue fix, and overall data overhaul and texture resolution alignment (that we aligned thousands to make them on the similar crisp/blur level) For Strike Fighters 2. This mod is yet to be released. This video is recorded in the "auto play" mode with no player involved.

I am thinking of a city night light solution. I would like to check if anyone tried this before, and what was the result The idea is to use a semi-transparent low polygon box that provides a layer of orange colour near the ground. And set the element to be rendered disregarding light levels. Just like the light on carrier deck. Each single element will cover a small area. Every 30/50 elements can be grouped to be 1 model to be placed to cover the entire road cross/block to simplify the planning. And they can be made destroya ble. Anyone?

View File Crash fix for Kamchatka 250m version with adjusted tileset This is a bug fix for the random crashing issue of the Kamchatka 250m tile set update released by Stary in below link Kamchatka 250m version with adjusted tileset etc - Thirdwire: Strike Fighters 2 Series - File Announcements - CombatACE If you are using the original Kamchatka 2.0 terrain released by Baltika, this is not applicable and you should avoid using it. Beautiful landscape tile. However it crashes randomly when flying in certain area or dropping bombs to airfields. The key issue is some incorrect file assignment in DATA.ini and how SF2 handles files in different season folders. It took me a long time to figure out. Hopefully this can help you as well. Installation: 1. Before everything, backup your KAMCHATKA_DATA.INI in your terrains folder. In case this breaks something else you have modded. 2. Extract the file contents and overwrite file if asked to terrains/KAMCHATKA folder Submitter orsin Submitted 08/27/2023 Category Full Terrains  

Night Lights for Kamchatka Terrain 250m tileset update View File This mod should be used in conjunction with the "night lights for City" mod released by me. Quick update to the entire Kamchatka 250m map to have night lights in cities. Installation: Before you begin. Backup your files Extract the ini files to Kamchatka terrain folder. Note this only works for Kamchatka terrain patched with Stary's 250m tileset PLUS the crash fix update released by me. Submitter orsin Submitted 08/29/2023 Category Environmental Mods  

File is now released for download. It only took me about 15 min to add lights to the entire Kamchatka terrain so it should be simple enough for anyone to do for any other terrain.

View File Night Lights for City The purpose of this mod is to enable some light decoration of city in SF2, which does not provide such feature out of box. This mod does not add real light source due to poor graphical outcome. It works in similar fashion as the old Janes F-15E Strike Eagle by adding some always bright points to landscape. Please note the mod itself does not automatically add lights to maps. You will need to follow the instruction inside the zip add lights using the Mue's Target Area Editor in link below. There is some step to add to the _TYPES.ini for each terrain before you can do that. Hence please follow the instruction below carefully. Mue's Target Area Editor - as part of the tool box I have included an effect file which could be called in _types.ini in terrain folder for anyone interested in experimenting night lights with real light source. This is currently disabled due to poor visual outcome. Submitter orsin Submitted 08/29/2023 Category Environmental Mods  

see my post above which links to an older post.

zoom it in. The 1st and the 2nd shots are to show the lighting looks unobvious during day time.

Proof of Concept. Any Good? every 20-30 lights are clustered as 1 x 30KB object that spans across some 200 meters. Easy to drop on map with no performance hit.

Well, better ask for a project that is open source and provides compatibility to the huge library of lod files here, than dreaming TW will invest in something that will never reward them.

This will be the last post in this discussion from me. Before this discussion close and leading to a separate tool that achieve these functions. I would like to clarify the intent - it is to provide limited, and easier way to mod objects after seeing too many authors left their models behind for good or bad, and try to allow more consistent way of modding to make model live longer. Regardless how capable one can be, even Sundowner e.g., we all have limited time and it is impractical for anyone to recreate a model from scratch when there are just a few aspects that need to improve from the existing. Calling a desire to improve as hacking is an overreaction... And the calls for the easier ways, are for the reason that INI edits being inconsistent in approach, error-prone, and sets barrier for new members to do the 3 most frequent tasks below. It is also hard to track every INI to get idea of how the previous contributor mod one way or the other, from authors to successors. 1. move nodes around 2. hide nodes 3. make nodes spin If we want to be a healthy community, we should at least think whether people are just asking things for genuine need and good intent, before going down the avenue of conspiracy. The latter is not a constructive approach and is not likely to get us anywhere. No matter how you consider me well versed in wording what I am telling. Here are the real example of what I experience in LOD of scenario 2,3,4, which correspond to my request 2,3,4 since #1 is already there. Just to show where my requests are from 2. Is it possible to include a function in this Lod Viewer, such that node names can be changed/renamed? There has been a number of older models which were created without care, and model elements are using repetitive names (e.g. 5 different elements all use lazy names such as Object 01) which confuses the engine and limit possibility for modding. Right now change of node name can be achieved using manual process in HEX editors for some models, but it is a difficult job when there are 50-60 items of a few repetitive name and you are trying to tell which one is which. It is also hard to handle in HEX editor as sometimes different model utilises different encoding. It will make life a lot easier. Not necessarily a example for repetitive naming of nodes in one object although that still happen so often. Anyways, without renaming, how are these black block nodes in the model ever going to be called?? 3. is it possible to add a function, such that an x, y, or z axis based, invisible parent with definable base point can be added to a node? We are not technically adding mesh here, but adding flexibility for existing items in the model to rotate on x,y or z axis Example - 1 layer of parenting node is never gonna work for Kashtan. Gun and Missile pitch angle will interfere with each other and gun is shotting at the sky all the time. 4. Is it possible to include a function to delete a node? This is much needed when modding stand in cockpits or variant of aircraft which we need to hide things. Right now people can add new items to an existing aircraft model using the Fake Pilot method, but it is very, very restrictive to remove anything from the existing model of an aircraft, e.g. low polygon/ugly items. Yes I realise this one is a little dangerous, but people need it and many have been doing it using workarounds for years when creating stand in cockpits. Instead of deleting people move elements away, but still it creates problems in different scenarios to cockpits, and like said it is much harder to do it to aircraft models. Example - These models fixed in the deck would have stayed there forever, and we'd never use random generated parked aircraft by SF2NA. if it wasn't Fubar512 did another release that deleted these. Removing node is a capability needed.

this is good thinking. However i am not sure if hidden nodes count polygons. For example, the new MIG-25 model has a landing gear system pipeline which itself counts for 1.5MB of size of LOD. It is causing a frame rate drop which i will definitely want to remove. I am not sure if the destroyed node method resolve an issue like this. Likely not.

Like said, I am asking for function for things people already are doing. It maybe a different and easier way, but there is no fundamental difference.

@mue Hi Mue, I have a few requests. 1. Is it possible to add a function, such that when an element is selected in the model, the viewer shows the X Y Z axis and the base point of the individual element? This is very needed for cockpit modding to do stand-in models. It will make life a lot easier. 2. Is it possible to include a function in this Lod Viewer, such that node names can be changed/renamed? There has been a number of older models which were created without care, and model elements are using repetitive names (e.g. 5 different elements all use lazy names such as Object 01) which confuses the engine and limit possibility for modding. Right now change of node name can be achieved using manual process in HEX editors for some models, but it is a difficult job when there are 50-60 items of a few repetitive name and you are trying to tell which one is which. It is also hard to handle in HEX editor as sometimes different model utilises different encoding. It will make life a lot easier. 3. is it possible to add a function, such that an x, y, or z axis based, invisible parent with definable base point can be added to a node? We are not technically adding mesh here, but adding flexibility for existing items in the model to rotate on x,y or z axis 4. Is it possible to include a function to delete a node? This is much needed when modding stand in cockpits or variant of aircraft which we need to hide things. Right now people can add new items to an existing aircraft model using the Fake Pilot method, but it is very, very restrictive to remove anything from the existing model of an aircraft, e.g. low polygon/ugly items. Yes I realise this one is a little dangerous, but people need it and many have been doing it using workarounds for years when creating stand in cockpits. Instead of deleting people move elements away, but still it creates problems in different scenarios to cockpits, and like said it is much harder to do it to aircraft models.