umlaut

Amazing work, mate. As always. Looking forward to getting it. If you still need testers I´d like to help out - but I´m not quite sure what I should do as a tester? Cheers

BFC knows. At least I hope so But they´re not telling. I bet they are working on it, though. But their policy seems to be that they would rather be completely silent than build up expectations that they´re not able to fulfill. My guess is that they are probably very busy working on a new patch for Black Sea. And it does seem to be a reasonable policy to iron out the worst errors of one release before you move your focus to the next one. Even though I personally wish they wouldn´t, as I have no interest in the modern games. I know BCF say they work on several releases concurrently, but it seems to me - as an outsider - that they pretty much focus on one title at a time. Hopefully, we´ll know soon.

It is not illiterarcy not to know all the Combat Mission related acronyms. It took me a long time to learn them too, and I still try to avoid writing too many of them for exactly this reason. UI = User Interface CMX2 = the Combat Mission 2 game engine. The first Combat Mission games used game engine 1. Those are Beyond Overlord (CMBO), Barbarossa to Berlin (CMBB) and Afrika Korps (CMAK). Since Shock Force (CMSF) the game engine 2 has been used. I hope you find a satisfactory solution to you key problem, CM (see, I did it anyway ) is too great a game to miss.

I think it will be there. Based on the other comments I´ve read around this forum, the Bulge game seems to be the next release. If that is correct, then the snow features should definetely be fully developed at that stage. I then see no reason why BFC should exclude snow from a subsequent RT winter module. And remember: There is already snow in CMFI´s Gustav Line module.

Flammenwerfer! (Messing around with new map)

Just made a quick test with my largest Bitvagorod/Umlaut´s Factory scenario. A large urban map with a huge amount of building mods, not to mention vehicle and uniform mods. I loaded twice with the mods installed and twice without: Without: 2:27 minutes average With: 2:57 minutes average

You seem to forget the time factor here. CMBN has been on the market at lot longer than CMRT, so of course there are more CMBN mods. CMBN was released may 17th 2011 - 1387 days ago. CMRT was released april 4th 2014 - 334 days ago CMBN 429/1387 = 0,3 mods a day CMRT 183/334 = 0,54 mods a day Ergo: The number of mods released on cmmods for CMRT is nearly double the amount of the mods for CMBN when time is taken into account. You point just became weaker.

No, I really dont think you can estimate based on the number of mods in the repository. Because the usefulness of the repository (search function and such) is so poor that many of major modders (most notably Aris, but also myself) have stopped using it - and switched to cmmods - long before CMRT was released. So most of the released RT mods aren't in the repository, whereas everybody was still using the repository when the majority of the CMBN and CMFI mods were made.

From my discussion with benpark - in the release thread: I just did some further checking, and it seems that I was partly wrong when saying that alpha channels become white in the windows of the modular buildings. I think now that the correct description is to say that alpha channels does simply not work with the windows of the modular buildings. The reason the windows looked white in my tests was because I had "turned off" the bmp file of the window - making the bmp white. When today I turned the original bmp of the window on again - the windows were back in the building. IE, nothing happened: the alpha channel" behind" both bmp´s had no effect whatsoever. Had this been "normal" CM bmp´s both files would have been transparent. Sorry if this has somehow misled you. Cheers

I´ve got some more comments but would prefer if we could continue in the Scenario Designer´s thread - as I think this discussion belongs there

Well, it is a long time ago since I tried modding them. But I just had a look and found two: window 5 and window 5u If you want i can send them to you Cheers

No, I don´t think there is a thread about this. I discussed the problems in private mails/messages with several modders and beta tester much more knowledgable than myself. The conclusion was that there wasn´t anything to do about the windows. Unfortunately. I may have misunderstood your question, but here goes: As far as I know, it is not possible to mod the damage alpha channels/textures for modular buildings. You can do it for independent buildings - and I did mod those to better fit my intentions. Cheers

Finally finished the Scenario Designer´s Guide to the mod set: Find out more here: http://community.battlefront.com/topic/118615-a-scenario-designer%C2%B4s-guide-to-umlaut%C2%B4s-factory-mods/

All right lads. Now there´s longer any excuse for not making scenarios with my Factory Mod set. As promised long ago I´ve made a guide on how to use the mods. It seems that it turned out to be in the shape of a video. Perhaps I went a bit overboard in the process, as it did end up being 10 minutes long. If you want to skip the background part, the how-to part starts at 4:43 Hopefully, this tutorial will tell you most of what you need to know. If not, that is what this thread (and perhaps future videos) is for. Best viewed in HD (720p)

There certainly is a way to use transparency. Otherwise this mod set would have been utterly impossible to make. The concept behind the transparency is called Alpha Channels. I must admit that I´m not entirely sure how they work, but I know how to use them. A bit like driving a car, I guess (at least in my case). In very basic terms, the procedure I use is this (in Photoshop): I paint whichever part of a texture I want to make transparent black (the colour irrelevant, as long as it is clearly discernable from the rest of the colours) - on a separate layer, using the pecil tool (to avoid any semitransparent pixels). When I´m finished, I use Select > Color Range to select the black area. I then save the selected area (surrounded by "marching ants") by clicking Select > Save Selection. Name it "black", for instance Now you will see a new layer called "black" in the channels tab (next to the layers tab, ususally in the bottom right corner of the screen). This layer is the alpha channel, and even though it is invisble in the bmp file it will make the bmp transparent in the selected areas. But it will only work if there isn´t a single semitransparent pixel in the alpha channel!! To ensure this, I always select the alpha channel and then select Image > Adjustments > Threshold. Click OK, and all semitransparent pixels should have vanished. Cheers

Experimenting a bit with dramatic night time lighting effects on new map (best viewed in 720p):

Great idea - I hadn't thought about that!! I' ve just tested your mdr file and it works perfectly. Could you edit the 251c/1 file too? Cheers

Thanks a lot for testing this too, Phil. I just wanted to comfirm that this wasn´t a problem that was isolated to my own version of the game. I appreciate that you found a solution by editiing the mdr file, but I don´t think that is a feasible solution in the long run: That would mean that I would have to upload one set of mods for those who have edited their mdr files and one set for those who hasn´t. The optimal solution in my opinion is that BFC fix this (or sumfink) - and now we have comfirmed that it is indeed not just a bug in my version of CMRT Cheers

Thanks a lot. Then we should be able to conclude that I am not the only one experiencing this bug. Would be nice if one or two more players could confirm this, though. Anyone?

I´m hoping for a bit of help with this bug thing from a couple of you guys. I´ve been told that the bug I described in the post above might only be a bug in my version of the game - rather than the game in general. So I wanted to ask if one or preferable two of you could check to see how the vehicles skins load in your own game? Please remove your 251 C mods before doing so, to make sure the game loads the original bmp´s. The bmp´s for the 251 C´s are exactly the same in CMBN and CMRT, but in my version of CMRT the hull bmp´s load in the wrong order - as described above and seen in the pic below. The CMBN pic shows how the bmp´s should load. Cheers 251C bug2

Thanks a lot. Technically, yes - but: I have made another set for CMRT and CMBN, get it here. The colours of the vehicles are different than in CMFI - and then they of course haven´t got snow. But I guess you could use this set in CMRT and CMBN as well if you prefer the more yellowish colours.

Talk about Mission Creep! I´d already modded snowy versions of Aris great SdKfz 251 D halftracks for Kohlenklau´s wonderful "Wacht am Rapido" campaign. But in one of the battles (the one with the bridge, I think) there is one single SdKfz 251/9 ("Stummel") - in the C variant! rek8 The nefarious Stummel So I thought I´d better snow mod that one too. But unfortunately Aris hasn´t made any mods of the C variants of the SdKfz 251. So this time I couldnt´t simply apply the snow on top of his base textures as usual. I had to mod the weathered, dusty base textures myself - from scratch. And then I thought: "When I´m already modding the Stummel I might as well mod the other five 251 C´s as well. That´s not going to be that much more work than making one". And so I did. And then I thought: "Well, Aris hasn´t made any 251 C mods for CMBN or CMRT either. Why don´t I mod those as well - based on the work I´ve already made for the CMFI 251 C? That´s can be that much work when I´ve already made them once and it would be a pity not to utilize this in the other two WWII games". So I modded those as well. Then I remembered that all these mods would have to have [muddy] versions too to be complete. So I made those. At this point the CMBN and CMRT versions were finished, so they were uploaded to GreenAsJade´s. The CMFI mods still needed the [snow] version. So I modded those... ...and now the SdKfz 251 C series is ready to for use in normal, [muddy] and [snow] variants. And that is how modding four little bmp´s for the Stummel in Kohlenklaus scenario ended up being three sets of mods - containing 125 bmp´s in total. Download them here. rek5 A complete set of weathered/dusty/snowy SdKfz 251 Ausf. C halftracks. The majority of the modding for this set has been made by yours truly, but I have reused a few of Aris´ 251 Ausf. D textures whenever possible - to save time (the guns of the 251c 9 and 251c 10 as well as the extra stuff on the 251c 7). I have applied the snow. All vehicles come in normal, [muddy] and [snow] versions.

Here are a couple of small vids meant as previews for my Factory Mod set and Bitvagorod Master Map (see link in sig line). No fighting, just peaceful driving through the devastation

I´ve just discovered a bug in the bmp files for these vehicles. Unfortunately it means I might have to upload an updated set of mods. Here´s my bug report from the tech forum:

MJkerner is spot on - except for one thing: There are no files with the number "1". It is "pz-ivg-hull", "pz-ivg-hull 2", "pz-ivg-hull 3", etc.