Royohboy

... may I add: - wrong .tga-options chosen for decal file> make sure you didn't save your .tga-file as RLE or run-length-encoded. That one took me ages to figure out, and it nearly drove me mad.

The Gabon ones most certainly - They are basically eight ex-French Skyraiders that had some trimming added and the insignia changed. BTW, I'm done safe for the trim colour for Escadron 3/20 "Oranie", and the squadron badge of Escadron d'appui aerien 1/21. Does anyone know if the latter is perhaps a smaller version of Escadron 1/20's Tiger badge (upper left of the pics below) ?

Burma and several PTO terrains for SFP1/WO* are available from the Avsim file library at http://www.avsim.com/

I just found out why the squadron-specific decals didn't work the way I wanted... [drumroll] Editing SQUADRONLIST.INI in the FLIGHT folder doesn't help any, because it belongs in PILOTDATA :blush2: However, adding my French Skyraider squadrons to the right SQUADRONLIST.INI helped, and I can now chose the squadrons I want from the drop-down menu in the loadout-screen or the mission-editor and have the corresponding markings show up on the plane: In the above example I assigned three different squadrons to the first three planes, and none to the fourth. The only problem is that the filenames of the squadron-decals have to correspond with the numbers of the squadrons in SQUADRONLIST.INI, i.e. for the green-tipped Spad that is [Squadron231] Name=E2-20FAF DisplayName=Escadron 2/20 'Aures-Nementchas' Nation=France The decal for the squadron code (20-L) would be SqCode231.tga at level-1 in this example (or SqCode***.tga in general). The fourth digit of the code is the aircraft number (or rather letter) at level-2; Letter001.tga in this case. However, the drawback is that as a skinner you don't know at what number the squadrons used will run if users have to add them to their squadronlist.ini, and hence the numbering of the level-2 decals is not set in stone (as it is at level-0). Wrench's approach of using level-2 for the squadron-stuff has the advantage that you don't reiterate the same aircraft serial numbers over several squadrons, but that each serial number is (can be) unique. However, there would be too many redundant files for my taste. BTW, thanks for the heads-up regarding the panel lines and the rivets So, does anyone think a canonic SQUADRONLIST.INI along the lines of the already canonicized NATIONS.INI would be a good idea? Nations could be allocated slots of so-and-so many squadrons (not neccessarily all the same number), leaving 'blank' squadrons for further / user development. OTOH that thing might turn out monstrous in the ned.

@Allen: Thanks a ton, mate @Wrench and Littlesmoke: So we can't really use level-1-decals the same way as we use level-2 and level-0... bummer! It looks as if it's the one-squadron-one-skin approach then. However, that would make all of level 1 pretty much redundant as you might as well paint anything squadron-specific onto the skin directly. I'll keep on searching for a better solution and will post it here if I find it. Thanks for your input

Why not use them with a USB-gameport-adapter? I bought a 15€ adapter, and now I can use my old home-built pedals and the Thrustmaster PFCS I bought for 5€ (the very stick I dared only dream of back when it was hot). I know my setup is very low-end, but using an adapter with a perfectly good stone-age HOTAS combo might be an alternative for the budget-minded. Oh, and [nitpick] it's gameport, not serial [/nitpick]

I'm trying to modify a *_avionics.ini with the goal of implementing a radar display like in German WWII nightfighters. I have begun exploring the remapping of several radar symbols, but now I'm stuck: AimDotSize=0.5 AimDotTexture=cockpit\RADARBLIP2.tga in [RadarDisplay] corresponds to Symbol[03]=AIM_DOT in [RadarDisplaySearch] etc., but TargetSymbolSize=0.5 TargetSymbolTexture=cockpit\RADARBLIP3.tga doesn't work for Symbol[02]=TARGET_SYMBOL . Does anyone know the variable name needed to remap the target symbol, or is that one hardcoded?

OK, looks like I'm on new ground here. Whatever I find out I'll make some write-up so somebody can put it in the knowledge base.

Wrench, thanks for taking the time to help I've looked at some of them, but what I'm really after is a 2-scope display like this: This is pretty much what German WWII Lichtenstein sets looked like. The above example shows two targets, the nearer one being off to the right (left scope), and at the same altitude (right scope) while the farther target is straight ahead, and slightly above. It's too bad we cannot define two radar scopes, but anyway... As a matter of fact it doesn't have to be a two-scope set; the peculiar form of indicating the target is what I'd love to get. This, together with Kesselbrut's hack to use a second crew-station, would make for nice night-intercept missions. With the range of those early airborne sets being extremely limited ground control played an important role, and the latter is something SF/WO* is really good at. Here is how far I got: the 'spike' is mapped to the aiming dot, not the target symbol. BTW, I also discovered that without the B_SWEEP the radar won't show any targets. Now, if I could get my blip mapped onto TARGET_SYMBOL, and if I then could get rid of the B_SWEEP I'd be pretty much where I wanted...

OK, I have just tried the Sea Eagle (sea-skimming anti-ship missile), and I can't complain about accuracy (it does even sea-skim). I'm fairly new to the game, so this write-up is merely a rather uneducated guess based on my interpretation of the parameters as shown in the weapons editor. My guess is that accuracy depends on several parameters being carefully balanced. I'm not too sure how much influence the "accuracy" value has. Looking at the Pescador in the weapons editor, however, there is only 5 seconds of propulsion which may be the main reason for missiles splashing prematurely. The value for arming time is 6 seconds - which would mean the missile is armed only after the booster has burnt its fuel, which in turn should limit the missile's usefulness considerably. In comparison the Sea Eagle from the Weapons Pack has an arming time of only 2.8 seconds, 2.8 seconds of booster + 250 seconds of sustainer propulsion. Any corrections to my naive assumptions highly welcome; as I said already I'm merely an interested dilletante.

I experienced the same with the Kormoran and Exocet missiles; I'd be very interested in a fix, too. I understand they don't sea-skim and have no active radar guidance because of limitations of the game-engine.

I just got WoV as my first Thirdwire sim and have found this great active modding community As far as I understand SFP1, WoV, WoE, and (at least to some extent) WoI all use the same engine, the main difference between the sims being the aircraft, worlds/terrains, and missions that come with them. Is this correct? My big question is which of the other Thirdwire sims are must-haves? Are there any particular strengths such as "this one models prop aircraft better, and that one is the way to go if you want modern HUDs"? Or is there any particular must-have Thirdwire sim for key add-ons to work?

So WoE it is

Guys, thanks for the warm welcome, and for your suggestions :-) I have installed Brain32's Vietnam tile repaint, and one of the tree-add-ons (not Green Hell though, I think, but I'm not sure), and WOW! It was a bit of hit for my humble old laptop, though (even with lens-flares and mirrors disabled). Nevertheless, it looks so much more beautiful than the last sim I played (SDOE, which had more realistic flight models OTOH). Does WoI model prop torque, and spins/stalls?