Stephen1918

It makes going to the dentist seem like fun.

Almost done! I'm adding eye candy, and I'm tweaking and testing. I've added a lot of Geezer's figure and objects (which he adjusted for Palestine. Thanks Geezer!) I've also added some camps for forces of the Arab Revolt and some Australian bases. There are Red Crescent medical building in the Ottoman camps, most of the cities have a bazaar, and I've reskinned some of my ground objects from the Eastern Front. Geezer is working on new skins for the city buildings. Ojcar has been working on campaigns for Palestine. He is checking my terrain to make sure it fits with his campaigns. We should be finished very soon.

You've done a lot of nice work! The seasonal terrains are wonderful.

Remember that the Be2c was designed for RECON, (most two seaters were.) It was a very stable platform which made it an excellent machine for aerial photography. Guns were added as an afterthought to give it some defense, but it was never intended to be a fighter.

Here are some images of where I'm at with Palestine. I've done some work on the height map to make the mountains more craggy. And I made all new TODs for the cities and farm land. I added a lot of unnamed towns to fill out the terrain. They're placed in the tiles, but not in the Target.ini. They're just there so you won't fly over kilometer after kilometer of farm land. I made some new ground objects - trains, water trucks, oil tanks, etc. and I re-skinned some of my older ground objects to fit the desert terrain. At the moment I'm placing the "special" buildings into the cities, and I've just started to place Geezer's ground objects into the airfields and supply depots.

These are looking good Geezer and will be a nice addition to Palestine! I've finished the TODs (that was a royal pain!) and I've done a lot of work placing terrain tiles and tweaking the height map. Now I'm placing objects in the Targets.ini. I'll try to post some screen shots in the next few days.

Edward included some parked aircraft in his Flanders terrain. They included destroyed versions and could be targeted. I started to make some generic planes under repair (with parts missing) but I got distracted by other things. I'll have to see if I can remember where I put them... Geezer, great job on the skins, by the way, I'm looking forward to the flying the Halberstadt.

The real world has been keeping me pretty busy lately, but I still manage to work on the Palestine terrain every now and then. I've made some new tiles and done a lot of work using Gerwin's TFD editor. Now I'm learning how to make TODs to make the cities look more crowded. Making TODs in the Terrain Editor is excruciatingly tedious, but (I keep telling myself) it's worth the effort. It's going to take a little more than "two weeks" to finish this...

Excellent models and skins. These will be a great addition to FE. I especially like the Brit AA gunners in their shorts. I'm looking forward to these.

There's a file in the FlightData.cat called the ViewList.ini that contains all the specs for all the views.

Wonderful work! I admire the level of detail you're putting into the model and the skins.

The planes will fly in pretty good formation until enemy planes come into range or AA starts firing, then everyone starts to take evasive maneuvers, flying in zig zags - thats probably the buzzing around you're seeing.

Thank you, gentleman! The bridge you see is one piece and it fits nicely on the river tiles, I'm using it over the Jordan. I've also made a larger one in sections that can be as long as you want, I'm using that one over the Nile and Suez. The tiles now are all 256 x 256. But I'm working on larger ones for the cities and farms. Ojcar - I'm looking forward to your campaigns. I've made a few changes to the Target.ini. I'll send it to you when it's done.

I've been working on a revision of Wrench's Palestine, which is based on Gepard's Suez terrain. I've done some work on the tiles, a lot of work on the targets, and I've made quite a few new ground objects. I've redone all the ports, train stations, airfields, camps, and movements, and I've made some new ground units. There is still a lot of tweaking and testing to do, but it's getting close.

No destroyed model yet. I started making the airship hangars and moored airships back when I did the airships last March, but I got distracted by other things. There are moored versions of some of the others too, and different sized hangars for them. By the way, Edward included a moored zeppelin in the Flanders terrain.

Congratulations on your retirement. (I'm starting to think along those lines myself.) I'm also a models/texture guy. I'm sure it will all come back to you, but if you need help remembering details about rigging, unwrapping, etc. let me know. Welcome back. I look forward to some great additions to First Eagles from you.

From time to time, when ending a mission, instead of a black screen, I get a mostly black screen with pieces of other screens showing - like a quilt. It doesn't happen often and it fixes itself pretty quickly. I've just assumed it was a memory issue since I have a pretty basic video card. I haven't tried to track when it happens.

The nice thing about Armchair Aces is that it's a series of campaigns and can be installed a little at a time. May I also suggest the Galicia Terrain and the Eastern Front campaign, this will give you a chance to fly a lot of Russian and Austro-Hungarian planes.

Very nice work! Good looking terrain too. The guns should be able to track while the train is moving.

Very nice!

While working on my next project, I noticed that the armored train cars started showing in place of tanks in Army Co-operation missions. I don't know why, since the GroundObjectRole was set to WAREHOUSE. I changed the setting to RECON for all the cars and the problem seems to be fixed. I still don't know why it happened. I have uploaded a new version with everything corrected. Still waiting for administrator approval. (Look for v2) I also fixed a problem with the rear wheel of the gun car in both versions.

These look fantastic! Even with no trains on them, they add a new level of realism to FE. (Of course, trains would be better!) I'm looking forward to the new Verdun!

First Eagles only has line-of-sight aiming, and that looked so wrong for big guns. I played around with making an object to be a target that would hover over the terrain... then I realized we already had balloons!

I uploaded two versions of an armored train. One for the tracks from Gepard's Railway Station, and another version that sits directly on the terrain. (Quack has mentioned that he is making some terrain tiles with railroad tracks on them.) There are five different cars, and three skins. I also made a rail mounted artillery gun that shoots at ground targets. I've included instructions in the Read Me that explain how to make it look like it's shooting at a distant target. All the cars are the same length to make it easier to place them in the terrain.