Mission question

peabody · 03-06-08, 02:49 PM

I just started playing with the mission editor. I have the sh3me_userguide but there are a lot of things I don't understand. Working on it.
But one question I have, is it possible to make a ship move at a certain time. For example, if there was a ship or several ships in a harbor and we recieved a intelligence report that they were leaving at a certain time and wanted to assign a sub to intercept, would that be possible? I have tried it and had the entry date at the time I wanted them to start moving. Then I ran it in the mission editor and they eventually moved, but the TC was way up and instead of moving at the entry time they moved much later. I had the TC at 16k and they moved in two minutes. I had the start of the mission at 13:15 and the entry for the ship at 13:40 just to test it and that is what happened. In game sometimes they moved, sometimes they didn't.

I would like to thank Ubi for having a help button that says "Silent Hunter 4 Mission Editor" that helped a lot!

Is there any other manuals for this or tutorials you can point me to. Much more confusing than the editor in my flight sim. I am starting to read through this forum and hopefully can find some good info.

Edit: I just opened the Battle off Samar mission to see if I could learn from it, and only one group moves. Yet in game they all do. What triggers the movement in game? Why is only one moving in the editor?

Peabody

Nisgeis · 03-06-08, 05:17 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by peabody

I would like to thank Ubi for having a help button that says "Silent Hunter 4 Mission Editor" that helped a lot!

Odd, when I read that part, I immediately thought 'Ah yes, that's what I need to do. I need to check the filter date.'

Only joking, the help is as good as the manual.

The problem you are seeing in the Battle off Samar is by default when you start the mission editor, it sets the filter start date (just below the help menu) to January 1938. At that time, most of the battlegroups do not exist (if they were for example first built in 1943), so the mission editor ignores them. Set the filter start date to the year and month of your mission and then play it. You should see now that everything moves.

I'm not sure, as I don't know the specifics of your mission, but I'd guesstimate that your mission is using units that don't appear for a year or two - if you run at 16,000x speed for a minute or two, then it will rack up the years until the unit does exist as it's been built and will then start moving. Just to the right of the time acceleration, it shows the date the mission editor is simultaing at the moment.

Hope this helps. If not, feel free to PM me, or send me the mission file and I'll have a look.

peabody · 03-07-08, 02:43 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nisgeis

I'm not sure, as I don't know the specifics of your mission, but I'd guesstimate that your mission is using units that don't appear for a year or two - if you run at 16,000x speed for a minute or two, then it will rack up the years until the unit does exist as it's been built and will then start moving. Just to the right of the time acceleration, it shows the date the mission editor is simultaing at the moment.

Hope this helps. If not, feel free to PM me, or send me the mission file and I'll have a look.

Thank you for the info, I know you didn't have must information to go on. I wanted at first to make a docked ship move. I quickly figured out I couldn't do that, unless maybe I could make it disappear and then respawn (I guess that's what it's called). But, I would have to make it impossible for the player to get within 20 miles of the time when the ship appears, right? So, I guess if it's not a harbor mission,there is not much sense in docking the ship.
But your information about the time being shown to the right of the acceleration did the trick! I don't have any idea where that date and time came from but it wasn't from anything I had. It wasn't even the same year. The problem was I couldn't see it. The editor doesn't fit on my screen 1024X768. I even said to myself, I wish this had a watch like the game so I could see when they are moving.
So now instead of using full screen I make it resizeable so then I can stretch the side to show me that info. That is what the problem was, but I still don't have any idea where the date came from, unless is it possible when I did the "Merge" with the "Campaign.loc" I think that was the file (I read it somewhere, if you want the docks you need to do that) . When I did it the mission wouldn't validate because some ships at Pearl were too close to each other, so I deleted them. It is working now, but I am going to try tomorrow to do the merge again because I don't have any docks, and then I'll know if that is the problem.
Thanks again for help with so little information to work with.

Peabody

Nisgeis · 03-07-08, 05:42 AM

If you are creating a single mission, you don't need to merge the campaign layer. By default the game will load up the campaign layer and all its traffic as well as your mission. This can make it tricky, when something from the campaign layer interferes with your single mission, but I haven't had that happen yet.

As for the spawning (you're right about the term

) then you are correct that the player has to get within 20 (I think it's km, not miles, not sure though) to have something spawn. If you had for example, a destroyer with an entry date of May 1 1942 and an exit date of June 1 1942 starting at Pearl Harbour with a way point to Midway, then the destroyer would only appear if the player got within 20 km of it at its spawn point in Pearl and from that point on it would start moving to Midway, but only if the player encountered it between May and June 1942, otherwise it wouldn't appear.

There is however a little tick box marked 'Evolve from entry date' on the unit properties. What this does is to tell the game to track in a table (without spawning or creating any units to keep processing down) where ships are. If you have evolve from entry date ticked, then the destroyer will leave Pearl in May 1942 even if the player is 200 km from Pearl Harbour. If the player gets within 20 km of where the game knows the destroyer would be, then it will then spawn the unit and you can then interact with it as if it had actually existed all along. This is how the dynamic campaign works as well, it tracks where all the ships would be, without actually spawning them anywhere. The entry and exit dates make more sense when you think that the campaign layer has to deal with air patrols increasing and bases being in hands of American / Japanese depending on dates.

As for the docked and then moving, I've not ever head cause to do this, but I believe this is how you would do it:

If you want a ship to be docked at a port and depart on May 26th 1942, then you'd add a ship and set it as docked, with an entry date of 1938 and an exit date of May 26th 1942. Then add a second ship of the same type set its entry date as May 27th 1942 and give that unit a waypoint out of the harbour - make sure you have evolve from entry date ticked. That should simulate a ship being in harbour if the player investigates, or just coming out of the harbour if the player goes in when it is scheduled to leave.

I'm at work at the moment, so I can't check this, I normally would fire up the editor and just test it, but unfortunately they don't let me play games at work (I know! How outrageous of them). It's possible what I've said is a complete load of rubbish.

I'll check this tonight to see whether I am giving you duff info or not.

peabody · 03-07-08, 11:15 AM

The only reason I merged the campaign is that without it, I don't know where to put the ships because there is no dock. First time out the Yamato was sitting in the parkin lot.

I was going to dock them just in case someone got there quicker than expected and decided to go in and check it out. I want to leave enough time in case someone runs into a destroyer and have to sneak by at 1/3, silent running etc. But if someone else were to play it and went flank, surfaced all the way then that may create a problem with things working the way they should. Another reason was so that I could put them there at the beginning of the mission so the campaign wouldn't put a ship where I am putting it.
Edit: Just remembered where I found it, it is a sticky "Place names and Harbors...." but I did not click saveable so the dock shows in game but not when I reload the mission into the editor.
As for the 20Km, I am not sure whether I read miles of Km, so you're probably right but either way I was farther away than that. But from what I read they will not spawn if you are closer than 20km because the game doesn't want this popping up out of nowhere. I'm not saying what I read was true, but that was the way it was explained. I just went in and tested by putting my sub in the harbor where I can see the docks and the ships did not appear, that's why I couldn't check it to find out why they weren't coming out of the harbor. But without my sub in the harbor, it worked last night after your info about the date, and I don't even know what I did that changed it. I just checked all my dates and they were fine and bingo the date in the editor changed. Glad you mentioned it because I have an older sony CRT and it won't go any bigger that 1024x768. I even have to hide the task bar and lift the properties window and I can just barely click the accept button.
I suppose it's possible that he ship appeared after they got 20km away from me, I will try to make them slow down with "change speed at waypoint to like 1Knot and go catch them to see if they really exist. After all I know where they are going.

Another odd thing is I did not get any contact warning when they approached. Very odd this editor. Looks like it will be quite a challange.
Now, I need to create waypoint all the way to a destination? What happens if I don't "delete at last waypoint" but have it end in the middle of the ocean, do they just wander around or keep going straight until the run into something?

I guess I bothered you enough, thanks for the help!!!

Peabody

03-06-08, 02:49 PM	#1
peabody Admiral Join Date: Jan 2008 Location: New York State, USA Posts: 2,390 Downloads: 126 Uploads: 7	Mission question I just started playing with the mission editor. I have the sh3me_userguide but there are a lot of things I don't understand. Working on it. But one question I have, is it possible to make a ship move at a certain time. For example, if there was a ship or several ships in a harbor and we recieved a intelligence report that they were leaving at a certain time and wanted to assign a sub to intercept, would that be possible? I have tried it and had the entry date at the time I wanted them to start moving. Then I ran it in the mission editor and they eventually moved, but the TC was way up and instead of moving at the entry time they moved much later. I had the TC at 16k and they moved in two minutes. I had the start of the mission at 13:15 and the entry for the ship at 13:40 just to test it and that is what happened. In game sometimes they moved, sometimes they didn't. I would like to thank Ubi for having a help button that says "Silent Hunter 4 Mission Editor" that helped a lot! Is there any other manuals for this or tutorials you can point me to. Much more confusing than the editor in my flight sim. I am starting to read through this forum and hopefully can find some good info. Edit: I just opened the Battle off Samar mission to see if I could learn from it, and only one group moves. Yet in game they all do. What triggers the movement in game? Why is only one moving in the editor? Peabody __________________ System Spec: Gigabyte GA-965P-DS3, PentiumD Dual Core Presler 945 3.4Ghz, Gigabyte Geforce 7600GS, 2-1GB Corsair XMS2 800Mhz in Dual Channel, 2-WD 250 SATA 3Gb/s, Onboard Realtek HD 7.1 Audio, DVD ROM, DVD burner, Hiper 580 Watt Power supply, WinXP SP2. Last edited by peabody; 03-06-08 at 03:12 PM.

03-07-08, 11:15 AM	#5
peabody Admiral Join Date: Jan 2008 Location: New York State, USA Posts: 2,390 Downloads: 126 Uploads: 7	The only reason I merged the campaign is that without it, I don't know where to put the ships because there is no dock. First time out the Yamato was sitting in the parkin lot. I was going to dock them just in case someone got there quicker than expected and decided to go in and check it out. I want to leave enough time in case someone runs into a destroyer and have to sneak by at 1/3, silent running etc. But if someone else were to play it and went flank, surfaced all the way then that may create a problem with things working the way they should. Another reason was so that I could put them there at the beginning of the mission so the campaign wouldn't put a ship where I am putting it. Edit: Just remembered where I found it, it is a sticky "Place names and Harbors...." but I did not click saveable so the dock shows in game but not when I reload the mission into the editor. As for the 20Km, I am not sure whether I read miles of Km, so you're probably right but either way I was farther away than that. But from what I read they will not spawn if you are closer than 20km because the game doesn't want this popping up out of nowhere. I'm not saying what I read was true, but that was the way it was explained. I just went in and tested by putting my sub in the harbor where I can see the docks and the ships did not appear, that's why I couldn't check it to find out why they weren't coming out of the harbor. But without my sub in the harbor, it worked last night after your info about the date, and I don't even know what I did that changed it. I just checked all my dates and they were fine and bingo the date in the editor changed. Glad you mentioned it because I have an older sony CRT and it won't go any bigger that 1024x768. I even have to hide the task bar and lift the properties window and I can just barely click the accept button. I suppose it's possible that he ship appeared after they got 20km away from me, I will try to make them slow down with "change speed at waypoint to like 1Knot and go catch them to see if they really exist. After all I know where they are going. Another odd thing is I did not get any contact warning when they approached. Very odd this editor. Looks like it will be quite a challange. Now, I need to create waypoint all the way to a destination? What happens if I don't "delete at last waypoint" but have it end in the middle of the ocean, do they just wander around or keep going straight until the run into something? I guess I bothered you enough, thanks for the help!!! Peabody __________________ System Spec: Gigabyte GA-965P-DS3, PentiumD Dual Core Presler 945 3.4Ghz, Gigabyte Geforce 7600GS, 2-1GB Corsair XMS2 800Mhz in Dual Channel, 2-WD 250 SATA 3Gb/s, Onboard Realtek HD 7.1 Audio, DVD ROM, DVD burner, Hiper 580 Watt Power supply, WinXP SP2. Last edited by peabody; 03-07-08 at 11:27 AM.

03-07-08, 05:42 AM	#4
Nisgeis Ocean Warrior Join Date: Jan 2008 Posts: 2,909 Downloads: 77 Uploads: 11	If you are creating a single mission, you don't need to merge the campaign layer. By default the game will load up the campaign layer and all its traffic as well as your mission. This can make it tricky, when something from the campaign layer interferes with your single mission, but I haven't had that happen yet. As for the spawning (you're right about the term ) then you are correct that the player has to get within 20 (I think it's km, not miles, not sure though) to have something spawn. If you had for example, a destroyer with an entry date of May 1 1942 and an exit date of June 1 1942 starting at Pearl Harbour with a way point to Midway, then the destroyer would only appear if the player got within 20 km of it at its spawn point in Pearl and from that point on it would start moving to Midway, but only if the player encountered it between May and June 1942, otherwise it wouldn't appear. There is however a little tick box marked 'Evolve from entry date' on the unit properties. What this does is to tell the game to track in a table (without spawning or creating any units to keep processing down) where ships are. If you have evolve from entry date ticked, then the destroyer will leave Pearl in May 1942 even if the player is 200 km from Pearl Harbour. If the player gets within 20 km of where the game knows the destroyer would be, then it will then spawn the unit and you can then interact with it as if it had actually existed all along. This is how the dynamic campaign works as well, it tracks where all the ships would be, without actually spawning them anywhere. The entry and exit dates make more sense when you think that the campaign layer has to deal with air patrols increasing and bases being in hands of American / Japanese depending on dates. As for the docked and then moving, I've not ever head cause to do this, but I believe this is how you would do it: If you want a ship to be docked at a port and depart on May 26th 1942, then you'd add a ship and set it as docked, with an entry date of 1938 and an exit date of May 26th 1942. Then add a second ship of the same type set its entry date as May 27th 1942 and give that unit a waypoint out of the harbour - make sure you have evolve from entry date ticked. That should simulate a ship being in harbour if the player investigates, or just coming out of the harbour if the player goes in when it is scheduled to leave. I'm at work at the moment, so I can't check this, I normally would fire up the editor and just test it, but unfortunately they don't let me play games at work (I know! How outrageous of them). It's possible what I've said is a complete load of rubbish. I'll check this tonight to see whether I am giving you duff info or not.