[REL] TMOPlot09032013

[Rockin Robbins]

You know, I really HATE the plotting systems in RFB and TMO 2.5. From the best plotting system in this universe, somehow Ducimus was talked into a cockamamie system where if you're zoomed out you can see a position, but zoom in too close, stand too close to the table and you can't see any of the marks any more. That makes about as much sense as a screen door in a submarine!

It's time for TMOPlot09032013!

Time to bring back the creation of Ducimus before he started taking votes on what his mods would look like! You say, those dots are GPS accurate, that's not justifiable. Well, as long as you have radar those dots are not only justifiable, but they ARE NOT AS ACCURATE AS THE REAL THING!

The real thing was analog, able to display all positions as accurately as the numbers. We have a pixel-based system where if the position is between two pixels, you have to choose one or the other, one error or the other error. This is called binning and is an artifact of all digital systems. Their analog radar didn't suffer from that.

All ships are plotted as a diamond at low zoom settings, changing to a position dot with no friend/foe/neutral color, unit designation, speed or course information on screen with higher magnifications. They no longer vanish because you are standing too close to the plotting table. God help us.......

This will work for RFB 1.52 and TMO 2.5. It will also work for all other mod configurations. In the case of FOTRS, which has many ship types not in this mod, anything TMOPlot covers will be shown as a position dot, anything not covered will be shown as FOTRS standard. I forget whether they used silhouettes or position dots. At any rate, the game will not crash and the mod will work.

It also uses all ships from RSRD so got that covered too!

[Bubblehead1980]

Originally Posted by Rockin Robbins

You know, I really HATE the plotting systems in RFB and TMO 2.5. From the best plotting system in this universe, somehow Ducimus was talked into a cockamamie system where if you're zoomed out you can see a position, but zoom in too close, stand too close to the table and you can't see any of the marks any more. That makes about as much sense as a screen door in a submarine!

It's time for TMOPlot09032013!

Time to bring back the creation of Ducimus before he started taking votes on what his mods would look like! You say, those dots are GPS accurate, that's not justifiable. Well, as long as you have radar those dots are not only justifiable, but they ARE NOT AS ACCURATE AS THE REAL THING!

The real thing was analog, able to display all positions as accurately as the numbers. We have a pixel-based system where if the position is between two pixels, you have to choose one or the other, one error or the other error. This is called binning and is an artifact of all digital systems. Their analog radar didn't suffer from that.

All ships are plotted as a diamond at low zoom settings, changing to a position dot with no friend/foe/neutral color, unit designation, speed or course information on screen with higher magnifications. They no longer vanish because you are standing too close to the plotting table. God help us.......

This will work for RFB 1.52 and TMO 2.5. It will also work for all other mod configurations. In the case of FOTRS, which has many ship types not in this mod, anything TMOPlot covers will be shown as a position dot, anything not covered will be shown as FOTRS standard. I forget whether they used silhouettes or position dots. At any rate, the game will not crash and the mod will work.

It also uses all ships from RSRD so got that covered too!

[chris455]

Probably a dumb question, but if map contacts are off, this won't work, correct?

[Rockin Robbins]

That's correct. The mod doesn't keep you from using any game settings you wish.

[Bubblehead1980]

Originally Posted by Rockin Robbins

You know, I really HATE the plotting systems in RFB and TMO 2.5. From the best plotting system in this universe, somehow Ducimus was talked into a cockamamie system where if you're zoomed out you can see a position, but zoom in too close, stand too close to the table and you can't see any of the marks any more. That makes about as much sense as a screen door in a submarine!

It's time for TMOPlot09032013!

Time to bring back the creation of Ducimus before he started taking votes on what his mods would look like! You say, those dots are GPS accurate, that's not justifiable. Well, as long as you have radar those dots are not only justifiable, but they ARE NOT AS ACCURATE AS THE REAL THING!

The real thing was analog, able to display all positions as accurately as the numbers. We have a pixel-based system where if the position is between two pixels, you have to choose one or the other, one error or the other error. This is called binning and is an artifact of all digital systems. Their analog radar didn't suffer from that.

All ships are plotted as a diamond at low zoom settings, changing to a position dot with no friend/foe/neutral color, unit designation, speed or course information on screen with higher magnifications. They no longer vanish because you are standing too close to the plotting table. God help us.......

This will work for RFB 1.52 and TMO 2.5. It will also work for all other mod configurations. In the case of FOTRS, which has many ship types not in this mod, anything TMOPlot covers will be shown as a position dot, anything not covered will be shown as FOTRS standard. I forget whether they used silhouettes or position dots. At any rate, the game will not crash and the mod will work.

It also uses all ships from RSRD so got that covered too!

Link is broken

[Rockin Robbins]

Originally Posted by Bubblehead1980

Link is broken

Link is fixed! Wonder what caused THAT? After all, it was a link to the Subsim download!

[Bubblehead1980]

Originally Posted by Rockin Robbins

Link is fixed! Wonder what caused THAT? After all, it was a link to the Subsim download!

Thought it was strange myself

[Rockin Robbins]

I modded directly from the whole game with TMO2.5 and RSRD with patches for both so I was sure to include all ships from both. It was so cool to load it up (you DO NOT have to install this while in port, by the way. Any time during a campaign including at sea is fine) and suddenly that invisible Aux Sub Chaser which had its Romulan Cloak of Invisibility running instantly became visible on radar! YESSS!

[maxswain]

Thanks for your time on this well needed fix. It's as right as rain again! Cheers Rockin Robbins

[Rockin Robbins]

It's always nice to be appreciated! Thanx.

[virtualpender]

Originally Posted by maxswain

Thanks for your time on this well needed fix. It's as right as rain again! Cheers Rockin Robbins

Yup - what he said!

[Liberatus]

Does mod remove sonar lines from a map?

[Sinkmore]

Ima give this a try!

I've always been annoyed that you couldn't see the contacts up close. It doesn't make any sense, unless it's a kludge to prevent you from making too-accurate marks on the map, or measurements therefrom. But, you HAVE the data, or you couldn't map it in the first place; so if uncertainty was the intent, it would be better to introduce the error into the initial data. So I hope that wasn't the intent, but I can't explain it otherwise. Anyway, thanks in advance for fixing the "broken" (nerfed?) map zoom disappearing contacts thing.

Thank you especially for building the mod to work with the "supermods". Too many great mods, large and small, don't work with each other. (I do understand why.) In the absence of a complex, comprehensive, omni-change-tracking modding protocol, which clearly even Ubisoft couldn't organize, I think building directly off the supermods is the next best / best practical thing.

I cry a little bit inside when I read the threads for the amazing ambitious mods done by individual modders, that were almost but never quite finished, then the modders went off to their eternal patrols, and now it's very difficult for anyone else to incorporate their work, so we have literally gigabytes of brilliant! beautiful! - but essentially unusable - content. (NSM, FOTRS-2.0...) big mods and small ones too.

Again, I understand why; it just makes me sad.

Another gripe is, there doesn't seem to be a modding FAQ or tutorial or anything to compile and preserve the hard won wisdom. Does every modded have to start from scratch, in the dark? Or am I just missing the boat?

(Edit for correcting iphone autotypo feature, "Ubisoft" came out "U is off", which I found amusing enough to add as a comment.)

[TorpX]

Originally Posted by Sinkmore

I've always been annoyed that you couldn't see the contacts up close. It doesn't make any sense, unless it's a kludge to prevent you from making too-accurate marks on the map, or measurements therefrom. But, you HAVE the data, or you couldn't map it in the first place; so if uncertainty was the intent, it would be better to introduce the error into the initial data. So I hope that wasn't the intent, but I can't explain it otherwise.

Yes, the intent was to introduce some minimal level of uncertainty.

I agree that it would be better to have the error in the actual data, but how would it be done? Nobody here has the ability to tear the game apart and rebuild it from the ground up.

[Sinkmore]

Originally Posted by TorpX

Yes, the intent was to introduce some minimal level of uncertainty.

I agree that it would be better to have the error in the actual data, but how would it be done? Nobody here has the ability to tear the game apart and rebuild it from the ground up.

Oh, I was very specifically thinking of Ubisoft when I wrote that!

It's not a game-killing bug or anything... It's a game - You have to suspend disbelief a little! But it would have been very easy for Ubi to introduce a random factor to sensors. Maybe not as easy as just gimping their map though.