Desert turns to Marsh

[MajorRH]

I attempted to edit the basic North African Operational Game. After I saved the file with a different name and then opened it to play, the sandy desert had turned to marsh. I repeated this without making any edits...same effect. Is there something different when you try to edit operational games? What am I missing?

[Desert Dave]

Originally posted by MajorRH:

I attempted to edit the basic North African Operational Game. After I saved the file with a different name and then opened it to play, the sandy desert had turned to marsh. I repeated this without making any edits...same effect. Is there something different when you try to edit operational games? What am I missing?

MajorRH,

Whenever you modify an existing campaign or scenario, you'll need to copy/paste the data stored in the Campaign Folder and place it in your new game folders.

Naturally, editing whatever changes you have made from the original.

For Example,

File Directory:

Bitmaps Folder -> Campaigns Folder -> _41-42 North Afrika Folder,

Campaign Localization:

;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;

;

; 1941-42 North Afrika - Custom Text

;

;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;

; COUNTRY ID's

#CANADA= Commonwealth

#DENMARK= Crete

#LITHUANIA= Malta

; Terrain ID's

#MOUNTAIN= Escarpment

#MARSH= Desert

; Unit ID's

#HQ= Mobile HQ

#CORPS= Brigade

#ARMY= Division

#ENGINEERS= Special Weapons

#ROCKETS= Artillery

#TANK_GROUP= Tank Regiment

#AIR_FLEET= Air Squadron

; Weather ID's

#TEMPERATE= Desert

#FROZEN= N/A

#DESERT= N/A

#MUD= Rainsqualls

#SNOW= Sandstorms

________________________________

Also Edited, so to fit the specific scenario SCALE and schematic:

Movement Costs, Terrain/Resource Defense Bonus, CTV's (... unique per Nation) and Weather zones to account for sandstorms and rainsqualls.

You will also need to alter the Campaign Configuration file, depending on which parts of your new scenario you have changed.

#CUSTOM_BITMAPS= 1

#CUSTOM_INTERFACE= 1

#CUSTOM_SOUND= 1

#CUSTOM_LOCALIZATION= 1

___________________________________

IOW, ANYTHING that has been changed from the ORIGINAL, default campaign (... or ANY scenario included) will need specific, special information stored in one of the files/folders.

When you do make alterations, and save the file, you'll need to CHANGE the name of the file, IE, something like... "_41-42 North Afrika Test"

**WRT to "desert into marsh"... instead of making a separate tile for desert, we simply used the marsh tiles and coloured them yellow.

So, you would need to make sure that your new "configuration" file included... Custom Bitmaps (... where the terrain tiles are located) is "1." Using "0" means that you have NO changes from the default game.

Naturally, movement costs and defense bonus, etc, were changed to "fit" the smaller scale.

I would suggest reading the "designer's notes" also.

Any questions on this scenario (... that I created) don't hesitate to ask.

BTW... just curious, and interested, but what changes did you intend to make?

[ September 30, 2006, 06:09 AM: Message edited by: Desert Dave ]

[MajorRH]

Thanks very much Desert Dave. It worked...and I learned something new!!

I just want to say that I think you did a fabulous job on this operational campaign game. Although I enjoy playing the big campaign games, I love the scale of your North African game. It brings back the days (years ago!)of the Avalon Hill board game Africa Corps.

In regards to some changes...

Given the scale, I was thinking about making the air campaign a bit more involved. Currently I see the scale of air units as Air Wings (vs say Squardon or Group). The axis begins with 1 German Air Wing and 1 Italian Air Wing, followed by a German Bomber Wing in December 41 (and maybe a group of FW190's). The Allies start with WDF Recon Air Wing and the Desert Strike Bomber Wing with a Spitfire Wing joining in May of 1942. So each side can build 2 Air Units and 1 Bomber Unit each of about the size of an Airforce Wing. I thought it would be interesting if the unit scale could be reduced to squadron (maybe group) size. I figured you could more than double the number of air units; get into some interesting bomber attack / interception / escort battles or air to air battles etc. The Combat Target Values would have to be adjusted for smaller scale. I don't know if this will really work or not given the scale of the Land Units. I think the Bombers had less strategic bombing roles and more tactical bombing roles (i.e. JU 87 Close Air Support). Some Target Value adjustment and testing would be needed here.

So I started on some research to get some specifics on the order of battle / deployments for both axis and allied forces in the theater, during the period but found incomplete and sometimes conflicting information.

Do you know of any good sources which I might check out?

Thanks Again and Cheers.