Starting work on a Custom Campaign

[wokelly]

It will focus around a British unit in Normandy, an armor regiment and their supporting infantry. The campaign will progress on a day for day basis, the first map taking place on June 7th 1944, and each map will take place the day following.

My main focus will be to make maps that are more tactics oriented then the original maps or the Moscow missions. NO MORE facing overwhelming enemy numbers (well maybe in one or two missions) and less trench assault missions. Reinforcements will be nowhere as common as before. On the bite and hold operations as soon as you capture your objective, some reinforcements (some extra inf, bren carries with 6 pounders) will arrive so you can set up for the counter attack, but most maps what you start with is what you have.

In these maps I will try to have realistic TO&Es, for example most British tanks you will use will only have 75mm guns, so you must be careful with your 17 pounder armed tanks, especially when you face Panthers and Tigers. Of course this TO&E rule applies to German Armor. Mark 4 Panzers will be seen most often (H series of course), sometimes with Panthers. Tiger will be rare but they will be in some of the missions.

The emphasis of this campaign will be tactical. Frontal assaults will be costly and should be avoided. And this is just more then lip service, I will try to modify maps so there are ways to flank safely, even with some of the LOS issues. Of course I will try not to make these areas terribly obvious so you will have to look for the best way.

Some maps will simply be using armor effectively against superior enemy tanks. For example you might be given 8 tanks, 6 of which are Cromwells and the other Two Challengers. The enemy may have 4 Panthers and you will have to use your tanks smartly enough to survive. A frontal assault will likely end up with you losing all your tanks since the two challengers are your only tanks able to confront a panther head on.

Its those kinds of things I want to focus on, overcoming the enemy smartly rather then overcoming the waves of enemy with inferior numbers.

While there is no historical basis for any of the battles or the unit that the campaign will focus around, I will attempt to try to try to follow the flow of the battle, such as your unit taking part in Operation Goodwood or Epson etc. Some missions will simply be bite and hold operations, take the town and hold against the counter attack, and some will be defence missions, for example the attempt by the Germans to push the allies back into the channel immediately after June 6h.

I plan to release my first mission when it is done. If people feel that the map is good and tactical then I will try to go ahead with a campaign, if it is not to people's liking then I probably wont bother trying to make more.

[ChrisND]

Awesome, looking forward to it. Maybe the modders can even cook up the right uniforms and extra vehicles for the final campaign product.

[Oudy]

I think I can supply you with one of those pesky shermans with a 17pdr gun.

Oudy

[wokelly]

Thanks oudy. This campaign will take time. I am working on the first mission as I watch the tutorials. Right now the LOS issues are a b*tch. I mean it seems no matter how many trees I stick between a the enemy and your guys, and even walls, they can still see you through it.

God, might already have failed before I began, cant find an effective way to flank yet without being seen. I thought the patch was suppose to fix this.

I also want to say this is pretty ambitious for me to do. I really am only starting to learn how to edit, but this is my goal. I am hoping once the first mission is done the others will take less time. The first mission is more to teach myself how to make missions, and once I have that down, I hope that other missions will be much quicker to make.

[ June 30, 2007, 07:53 PM: Message edited by: wokelly ]

[Oudy]

Wokelly

Because the map sizes are so small, the only practical way to flank is by using the topography of the ground. Pick maps with lots of undulation. Then you can have some flanking.

Placing enemy units to take advantage of terrain is definitely time consuming. You have to test and test and test.

I'm looking forward to seeing what kind of missions you make.

Oudy

[SlapHappy]

There is a file called visibility.ini which seems to control a lot of the calculations for how particular units are seen and to what extent, etc.

It's about 28k in size and is extensively commented, unfortunately, in Russian. I have nyet knowledge of this language. Have you seen this file Oudy?

[Oudy]

SlapHappy

Yes, I've looked at the file, but I haven't tried to fiddle with it or figure it out. No Russian language skills here either (just funny google). Since there are no heavy forests, no way to enter buildings, or hide behind walls, I think the visibility model is fairly good. On the other hand it would be nice to have some heavy forests, walls and buildings for cover.

I have yet to look at the map editor (I'll do so soon) so I don't really know what you can do with it yet. Maybe people will develop some tricks for creating cover.

I think that mission designers will have to take advantage of the strengths of the game and try to minimize its weaknesses when creating missions and campaigns. The most popular missions will probably end up being those that play to the game's strengths.

Oudy

[wokelly]

Yeah map editor is pretty easy to use. You can swap between moving static objects, trees and background trees.

I was hoping that trees and shrubs would help cover flanking maneuvers in the new patch but apparently not. This makes things a bit more harder for me then...

Is there anyway to get the enemy to hold fire until a trigger is triggered? I figure I could set triggers at certain areas to simulate thick tree cover and walls in front of their positions. For example say you have two thicksets of trees, and a road running between them. If you set a trigger there, could you program it so the ATGs would open fire once an enemy unit entered that area?

[Freeboy]

What about tree thikness? I was wondering about how to do hedgrows.. they should be stoppers for tanks and prevent imediate line of site... but over the top with appropriate hillsides.. good luck.. let us know how we can help.

[SlapHappy]

wokelly

You could, I believe change the "enemy status" of an army, or group, or etc. by triggering it from a certain unit(s) entering a rect. A rect is a defined box area within the scripting language. A group of units with a "neutral" status will not engage any force which they have neutral status with. Their icons appear as grey in the game. You could do this by changing the army from one that is neutral to one that is not by your entering a certain area using this command:

3.5.2 ChangeArmy

Changes the army of the given unit set. Can be 1 unit (with the unit identifier), unit group or the whole army.

</font><blockquote>code:</font><hr /><pre style="font-size:x-small; font-family: monospace;"> Syntax:

ChangeArmy ( <ObjectType> , <ObjectID> , <NewArmyID> ) </pre>

[SlapHappy]

Wokelly

Keep in mind this does not keep your units from firing on those same scripted enemy units if they have LOS to the enemy and are not under "Hold Fire" command when using the Firemode option.

However the ChangeArmy option should work mutually, because your troops will not fire on neutral entities.

[SlapHappy]

BTW you can also set a dependency based on distance from the enemy rather than basing it on a rect zone as well.

[SlapHappy]

3.5.4 Distance

Returns the distance between the specified objects

</font><blockquote>code:</font><hr /><pre style="font-size:x-small; font-family: monospace;">

Syntax:

Distance ( <ObjectType_1> , <ObjectID_1> , <ObjectType_2> , < ObjectID_2> )

<ObjectType> - “UNIT” || “POINT” || “RECT”

<ObjectID> - identifier of an object of the specified type (a constant or variable)

Example:

[Trigger]

Set @dist = Distance ( UNIT , 179 , POINT , "point" )

// The local variable dist is set to the distance from the object with the identification number 179 to the named point - point

Halt

[Trigger]

SET @mainUnit = 12

SET @ptTarget = “Point0”

SET @dist = Distance ( UNIT , @mainUnit , POINT , @ptTarget )

// The local variable dist is set to the distance from the object with the identification number 12 to the named point Point0

</pre>

[Gnasher]

Panthers & MkIVs should be approx 50/50. Take for example the 12th SS Panzer Regt who I guess will be a prominant opponent. 1st Battalion contained 5 companies of Panthers (79 tanks) whilst 2 btn had 6 companies of MkIVs (96 tanks).

I've been doing some research for my own Normandy missions. Another thing that needs doing IMO is the maps need to be edited & lots more trees put in to recreate the bocage country.

[Reichenberg]

wokelly, they way you want to stray away from the missions shipped with TOW seems to be the exact right way to improve the game. I always think the amount of reinforcement troops is way too high. To get the same amount of troops you have started with two times as a reinforcement feels odd. Same goes for the TO&E - seems a bit off now and then with standard missions.

Looking forward to your first mission and hopefully the full campaign afterwards.

Uwe

[FinnN]

That sounds great! If you need any assistance creating custom units (not just uniforms) let me know and I'll give you a hand (in a couple of weeks).

Have fun

Finn

[wokelly]

Thanks for the help slapstick. I must say, I have very little knowledge in coding so those fill-in codes will be helpful.

Reichenberg, yeah I realize many units have almost a 50/50 split between panthers and mark 4s, but for example the only unit to counter attack on the first day was an armor unit make up of 100% Mark 4H tanks. It will vary, the point is you will not likely face dozens of panthers. THere will be variety.

I think I am going to have to use triggers and hold fire/open fire to represent cover. Anyways if I get the triggers working I hope to have my first mission out for evaluation by hopefully next weekend. Well I hope so.

[ July 01, 2007, 08:31 AM: Message edited by: wokelly ]

[pad152]

One of the issues I keep running into with mission design is the amount of ammo, without reinforcements your original units run out of ammo even if they survie. Either you need reinfocements or a big time lag between emeny waves to collect weapons and ammo from the dead.

I really wish there was some sort of ammo carrier in the game.

[wokelly]

Okay managed to get the enemy to hold fire so I can start trying to get the open fire triggers in place. The new problem is the fact the LOS issue goes both ways and my soldiers can see the enemy so they shoot at them. Now I have an enemy that wont fire and my super soldiers that can see through walls and trees.

*sigh*

EDIT: Hey how do you turn off hold fire in scripting? I have the Germans holding fire:

FireMode ( Army , 2 , "HOLD" )

Now what would have them open fire?

FireMode ( Army , 2 , "OPEN" )?????????????????

or is there something else i must do?

[ July 01, 2007, 09:16 AM: Message edited by: wokelly ]

[SlapHappy]

From the post above:

</font><blockquote>code:</font><hr /><pre style="font-size:x-small; font-family: monospace;">

Example:

[Trigger]

FireMode ( UNIT , 4 , “HOLD” )

// The unit with the identification number 4 was set to the hold fire state

Halt

[Trigger]

SET @groupVar = "Group1"

FireMode ( GROUP , @groupVar , “FREE” )

// The group of units Group1 was allowed to shoot

Halt </pre>

[wokelly]

Okay thanks. Look I hate to ask you to do work on my project, but could you or anyone make me a open fire trigger for me.

What I need is a trigger that, when Army 1 (Players army) gets within say 10m of the point "Openfire", that Army 2 will have FireMode (Army, , "FREE").

I was trying to base it off the tutorial 5 move script but it hasnt been working out.

[SlapHappy]

Originally posted by wokelly:

Okay managed to get the enemy to hold fire so I can start trying to get the open fire triggers in place. The new problem is the fact the LOS issue goes both ways and my soldiers can see the enemy so they shoot at them. Now I have an enemy that wont fire and my super soldiers that can see through walls and trees.

*sigh*

From above:

Wokelly

Keep in mind this does not keep your units from firing on those same scripted enemy units if they have LOS to the enemy and are not under "Hold Fire" command when using the Firemode option.

However the ChangeArmy option should work mutually, because your troops will not fire on neutral entities.

[FinnN]

If the 3D data in the maps is editable then you could sink the roads slightly and put a slight rise on either side on which to put the bushes. I don't think anyone's done this yet, but the format has been identified so maybe it would work. That would get you the required LOS effect as you'd have lots of mini reverse slopes.

Have fun

Fin

[wokelly]

Originally posted by SlapHappy:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by wokelly:

Okay managed to get the enemy to hold fire so I can start trying to get the open fire triggers in place. The new problem is the fact the LOS issue goes both ways and my soldiers can see the enemy so they shoot at them. Now I have an enemy that wont fire and my super soldiers that can see through walls and trees.

*sigh*

From above:

Wokelly

Keep in mind this does not keep your units from firing on those same scripted enemy units if they have LOS to the enemy and are not under "Hold Fire" command when using the Firemode option.

However the ChangeArmy option should work mutually, because your troops will not fire on neutral entities. </font>

[SlapHappy]

Originally posted by FinnN:

If the 3D data in the maps is editable then you could sink the roads slightly and put a slight rise on either side on which to put the bushes. I don't think anyone's done this yet, but the format has been identified so maybe it would work. That would get you the required LOS effect as you'd have lots of mini reverse slopes.

Have fun

Fin

The demo for Geoscape 3d will open the .raw heightmaps from the game. There are two heightmaps, one based on a 1024 x 1024 size called FarHF.raw and the full-size map NearHF.raw. You can edit the terrain details within the program and then there is an export to RAW option available. The demo is a fully functioning version of the software, however it places a water-mark on the exported materials. I haven't had much of a chance to play with the program, but you can definitely edit the maps with it.

I think it's entirely possible that this was the package used to create the game heightmaps. I've opened some of the RAW files and compared them with the Maintex.tga map texture using the IMFViewer from Oudy. They match up perfectly. I'm not sure how editing the terrain maps will affect the resulting texture fit and look. I suppose one could simply edit the texture maps in Photoshop, if desired. I have no experience with this. Since you can create new heightmaps with Geoscape 3d, I guess it would be possible to create entirely new maps.

Of course, there is the issue of that watermark......