Need help to find some files

[Knokke]

That's an excellent name indeed. I'll have to read that book as well.

By the way, I found a "strange" RAF reconaissance picture of the Arnhem bridge dated from the 6th september (before the operation began), but the picture shows the vehicles of Gräbner on the bridge, almost where they where destroyed on the ramp. The picture is not of good quality enough to make sure they where destructed at the time the picture was taken (I would say they appear intact, because there is not trace of burning on the road and no wreckage). This would mean the picture is really from the morning of the 18th September, not the 6th, and looks like it was taken only seconds before the destruction of the Hohenstoffen recon squadron. The final position of the vehicles on the bridge is a little bit further up the ramp on other pictures showing the wreckage. By comparison with pictures taken on the 19th september clearly showing the destroyed vehicles and the surrounding area, I'm pretty sure this picture was taken on the 18th, because there is are two british fox-holes just a the entry of the bridge showing on the 19th september picture and one of them is missing from the "6th september" picture.

One sure can learn a lot from aerial recon photographs. A set of photograph really from the 6th september clearly shows the german FLAK positions on the south bank of the Rhine near the brickworks opposite the Museum, that stopped the progression of the 1st Para on the 19th. Cornelius Ryan in "A bridge too far" states that the flak position where located in the brick factory, but the aerial photograph clearly shows that they were located on the western side of the building, outside the brickworks.

[Sneaksie]

BTW, if you've thouroghly studied the Market Garden op, how accurately CC2 simulates it (if you've played it)? What is accurate and what not?

[Gnasher]

I haven't played CC2 only 3 & 4. I do however have 8-9 books on the Market Garden battles, so if you have a question ask away....

Within the limits of the ToW1 engine there are I think 4-5 good campaigns that will not require use of buildings, sadly because of this Arnhem Bridge would be left out:-

British Airborne in Arnhem outskirts, Oosterbeek & Gynkel Heath

101st on Hells Highway

XXX Corps Joes Bridge etc

German 6th FJ Regt on Hells Highway

Betuwe battles

[Knokke]

I've been playing CC2 a lot. I think the parts I identified as the most ressembling the actual operation is the Arhnem railway bridge map and the Arnhem higway bridge map.

I think the campaign in CC2 was very well done, with good ideas like weather affecting the drop of supplies and reinforcements, and a sense of progression in the campaign. The last map was good, with tank fighting on the causeway. i would say it was pretty accurate, despite the limits of the game engine.

The battles of the 82nd airborne before entering Nijmegen could also be simulated in ToW1, because a lot of fighting was done out of buildings in open areas:

The capture of the Grave bridge, capture of the bridge at Heumen, the battle for the drop zones around Groesbeek heights and the Grafswald, the skirmishes around Berg en Dal.

In Nijmegen, a lot of fighting took place in builded areas, so it would be difficult to simulate in ToW, as will be the crossing of the Waal by the 2nd Batallion of the 504th PIR, as we lack assault boats.

[Sneaksie]

There were no assault boats in CC either, so i think that river crossing is do-able. On CC map there were trenches on the beach and British must capture them and the following 2 maps asap, because Germans were obviously getting more reinforcements. The only thing we lack in Tow for this op would be on-map mortars, but i recon that it was winnable even without them. Heavy casualities map, it should be fun:)

[Sneaksie]

I was trying to do 3 first maps of CC3 in ToW, they fitted into one ToW map and a lot of space was still left. I'd say it's 80% done - most time took creating something in empty areas. Sadly i've abandoned it for almost an year. I've tried creating missions in it, of course there are plenty of ways to do them. I've used Battle Generator to create 3 missions on it using different areas of the map, creating a campaign or one big mission including original three of CC should be even more fun. I've try to complete it, but since it was my first attempt in builder some areas of the map look ugly)

[Knokke]

That's true, there was a map simulating the crossing of the Waal by 504th PIR in CC2; I forgot about that one. The battle started on the river bank and the american paratroopers had to cross a barred stretch of land in front of the german positions. It was a map where the player took heavy casualties, but it was managable with good fire support.

I would really have liked to see on map mortar support implemented in ToW as it seems to have been planned at the beginning (I remenber some nice old screenshots showing a german mortar team). Do you know why it was dropped in the final version? Anyway, off map mortar support is available, even if it would be nice to have an on map mortar team to give support on a smaller scale.

I'd like to see your adaptation of the 3 CC3 maps. I liked this game very much too.

[Knokke]

Sneaksie,

About my attempts to make my Typhoon work in game:

Could you explain what's the use of visibility sphere and collision sphere? Do theses objects need to be part of the 3DS file? or is the following lines in the hier.him enough to make it work?:

[_ROOT_]

VisibilitySphere 6.65700

CollisionObject sphere 6.59100 0.0 0.0 0.0

BoundBox -3.439000 -6.327000 -1.011000 6.162000 6.327000 1.638000

best regards,

-Knokke

[Sneaksie]

Mortar teams were dropped because of time constraints. They need a lot of complex animations for moving and the system of mortar fire was not ready. For Kursk43 stationary battalion mortars (81 and 82mm) are planned, as well as mortars on Hanomags.

These objects must be actually made in MAX file. Converter makes Hier.him file using Hier.mcn, where modeler must describe all bones.

For example, in Hier.mcn must be strings like

[_ROOT_]

CollisionSphere <name of object in MAX file>

VisibilitySphere <name of object in MAX file>

and converter makes hier.him with correct coordinates. After that .mcn file is not needed for the game.

[Gnasher]

Any updates on progress available gents?

[Knokke]

Hi Gnasher,

I'm back with the best of news:

The Typhoon is now working in game using MshConverter 1.17.

Well... almost.

There is still but a small problem with textures not displaying correctly. It looks like the UV mapping is a little bit messed-up, and I have yet no idea why this is happening.

But at least, other than this texture problem, everything seems to work correctly as far as I can tell. The typhoon is attacking ground targets just like the Hurricane (with cannon fire only), it is casting a shadow correctly on the ground. I still have to create a test mission to see if it can be destroyed by AA fire.

I did'nt expect it to be working perfectly right from the beginning, so despite the problems, it's still a big step forward.

http://pigeonh.free.fr/typhoon_ingame_01.jpg

[Gnasher]

Extremely cool!

Good luck with the mapping!

[Knokke]

I'm making more progress. I've fixed the texture problem (looks like the texture mapping is flipped 180° when converted from 3DS to msh).

But I still have a problem that I don't understand yet - it looks like there is some problem with either the display of the LODs or the textures mipmaps, because from various angles and distances, the textures appears all black...

I really don't understand what the problem could be. It seems LOD1 is the only one to show correctly :confused:

http://pigeonh.free.fr/typhoon_ingame_02.jpg

[Gnasher]

Pass the tissues Vicar!

[Sneaksie]

I'm making more progress. I've fixed the texture problem (looks like the texture mapping is flipped 180° when converted from 3DS to msh).

But I still have a problem that I don't understand yet - it looks like there is some problem with either the display of the LODs or the textures mipmaps, because from various angles and distances, the textures appears all black...

I really don't understand what the problem could be. It seems LOD1 is the only one to show correctly :confused:

http://pigeonh.free.fr/typhoon_ingame_02.jpg

Good work!

Send the zipped 3dobj Typhoon folder to dina@1c.ru, we'll try to determine why other LODs are black. Probably there is a problem in skins.ini

[Gnasher]

Cmon chaps, make my Xmas & gimme a Tiffie!!

[Knokke]

Thanks a lot for your offer Sneaksie, but in the mean time, I found the problem. Everything is working fine now.

I had a talk with Santa-Claus a few days ago; and he told me he agree to make an other round with a Christmas present that was not ready on time for the 25th December:

A brand new (and working) Typhoon (although it is still a beta)

Here is a preview of the chrismas present taking pot shots on an unlucky german recon vehicle:

http://pigeonh.free.fr/typhoon_ingame_03.jpg

I still have to wrap the gift correctly before giving it to Santa, but it should'nt be long.

-Knokke

[Gnasher]

Knokke,

This for me is the single most impressive acheivement anyone on this board has made. The Typhoon looks sub zero cool , I can't wait to get my grubby mits on it when it's fully working.

Have you got the Rockets & Bombs working yet?

Also does this mean that Pandora's Box has been opened? Are we at the beginning of a string of user made content?

Do you have any other projects in the works? If so pray tell!

Good Work that man!

[Knokke]

The bombs and rockets are not working yet; i still have to figure how the config files work for rocket firing planes, and didn't try the bombs yet. The Typhoon as yet will attack ground targets with 20mm cannons only. But this should'nt be difficult to achieve.

I'm not sure if Pandora's Box has been opened yet, because I did manage to have only the Tiffie working for now. All my tries with static objects have ended in failure (even the simplest ones). I have three Horsa gliders finished (one intact, one with tail detached and cargo door opened for unloading, and one crashed), two buildings finished (the Grave bridge over the river Maas and the Van Sasse pumping station for the Grave bridge map i'm trying to do), and the St-Elisabeth Church in Grave awaiting complexion, as well as the Dutch bunkers protecting the bridge.

All theses objects seems to load correctly in the Map Editor, they appears in the list of static objects, but they are nowhere to be seen in the preview window...

I'm suspecting there is some mistake with the setting of the LODs, because there is something I don't really understand there: the center.msh having a visibility distance of 50, as if it was a LOD in the BIG_Bridge exemple file that Sneaksie generously provided us with.

At least, I now know how to create new kinds of air support for the game. That is still a beginning. I'll probably have a try at doing a simple vehicle, to see if I can make it work too (perhaps a small parachutable motorcycle as used by the British paratroopers- I could probably use it in some Market-Garden maps, or the modified jeeps with MGs).

-Knokke

[Gnasher]

Typhoons on the Bulldog Gavrus map:-

Just need the 60lb rockets & 500lb bombs now!

Seriously good work Knokke!

btw there's a minor bug in the instructions : units needs to go in data\units not TOW main folder, but as you can see I figured that out.

[Gnasher]

Hi Knokke,

Small observation, I've just noticed that the RAF tailflash colours on your skin are in the reverse order, they should be from the front; red, white, then blue. Maybe they are FFAF !!

This is bloody brilliant good luck with the static objects, get Sneaksie to help you.

Cheers

Gnash

[Knokke]

I'm glad you like it.

About the RAF tailflash: you're right. This is the mistake all the French have a tendency to do. I'll correct this immediately (as well as the installation instructions) and start to work on the bombs and rockets carrying versions.

-Knokke

[Gnasher]

Bombphoons:-

Rocket Attack:-

[Knokke]

Hi Sneaksie,

Could you be able to help me with this issue?

It looks like i'm unable to set my files properly to have bridges with pathfinding cells working to allow the AI to cross bridges.

here is the way I've set the collisions in max for my bridge:

http://pigeonh.free.fr/bridge_3D_1.jpg

http://pigeonh.free.fr/bridge_3D_2.jpg

But once loaded in the Map Editor, it looks like only the collisions for the side of the bridge (x_bar_dam0_1 and x_bar_dam0_2) are working and the collision object x_bridge_d0_1 who should allow the pathfinding cells to turn white to allow crossing of the river is not working properly.

Here is what I get in the Map Editor:

http://pigeonh.free.fr/Grave-5.jpg

http://pigeonh.free.fr/grave-6.jpg

Only pathfinding cells under the objects x_bar_dam0_1 and x_bar_dam0_2 seems to be working properly. The pathfinding cells under the object x_bridge_d0_1 are still red where I would expect them to be white to allow crossing of the river.

The AI vehicles and soldiers can use the bridge only up to the river line and are blocked where the pathfinding cells are red under the bridge:

http://pigeonh.free.fr/Grave-7.jpg

What is the proper procedure to allow the pathfinding cells to turn white under the x_bridge_d0_1 collision objects?

I hope you'll be able to give me an answer. Even when importing a default bridge from the game and re-exporting it to ToW without changing the object, I have the same problem of the pathfinding cells not turning white and not allowing the AI to cross rivers.

What am I doing wrong here?

Best regards,

-Knokke

[Sneaksie]

Did you execute 'recalculate pathfinding cells' command in Builder? Probably yes, of course.

Grave-6 picture is very strange, it seems that pathfinding cells are inverted under the bridge in water.

What's the contents of hier.mcn file of your bridge?