[REL] ComSubPac & ComSubSoWesPac Letterheads Mod

Sea Otter · 08-09-08, 11:21 AM

Greetings, Subsimmer's!

I learned a great deal by making this simple mod. Now I understand why modder's use a [WIP] (Work in Progress) announcement when they do a mod. I posted my mod and within hours members of SUBSIM were sending me some great suggestions and information. Donner, one of our moderators, even sent me images of actual documents with the admirals' signatures on them!

I'm pretty sure this will be my last version. If you downloaded one of the earlier ones and have to download again, I am sorry. I know now that I am a "rivet counter" and could spend hours researching. Thanks to the community, I'm satisfied with this mod's latest release.

This mod was inspired by Kapt.Klaus's Orders Document mod and GREATLY improved by info provided by Donner. Also, thanks to Bosn for telling me the Navy uses "CAPT" for captain instead of "CPT".

In fact, when I began playing SH4, I was looking to add little touches of realism to the game. His was one of the first mods I downloaded. Thanks KPT.Klaus for allowing me to use your work as an inspiration!

This mod comes in two versions. The first is for Subsimmer's who play a lot out of Pearl, Midway, etc.

I chose RADM Lockwood to be the ComSubPac represented here. The ComSubPac at the begining of the war in the PTO was RADM T.T. Withers. He is noted for loading his sub commanders up in an airplane and showing them how visible their submerged subs were even at deeper depths. He was followed by RADM Robert English who was tragically killed in a plane crash. The last ComSubPac during the war was RADM Lockwood who served the longest in this capacity. Lockwood also wrote the book, Sink 'em All! For these reasons, I chose him to be the ComSubPac represented on the letterhead. I was reading ADM I. J. Galantin's book, Taker Her Deep and found that the distinguished Sub Commander, Richard G. Voge, served as Lockwood's Operations Officer, so I chose him to be the Ops Officer represented in the mod.

Here's the FileFront link:
http://files.filefront.com/Pacific+L.../fileinfo.html

The second version is for Subsimmer's who play a lot out of Australia.

I chose RADM Christie to be the ComSubSoWesPac represented here. RADM Lockwood was also a good candidate due to his fame, but he got bumped to be ComSubPac after RADM English was killed in a plane crash. Since I was using Lockwood in my mod for ComSubPac, I went with Christie.

Christie wasn't without his controversies (he helped design and develope the MK VI Magnetic Detonator as well as the MK XIV Torpedo and got into it pretty heavily with his boss Admiral Thomas Kincaid over a lot of issues), but you gotta love an admiral who went out on a real patrol or two! I did a little digging on the internet and found that CPT Murray T. Tichenor served as Christie's Operations Officer, so I chose him to be the Ops Officer in the mod. There is an interesting bit about him in the book, Australian Commandos by A.B. Feuer. Evidently Tichenor went along for the ride when the USS Harder was sent on a rescue mission to retrieve a commando unit.

Here's the FileFront Link:
http://files.filefront.com/Southwest.../fileinfo.html

Historical Tidbit

In digging around, I found that the Commanders, Submarine Force, Pacific and Southwest Pacific (ComSubPac & ComSubSoWesPac) were rear admirals. It was interesting to note that at the time, there was no "one star" admiral's rank. You went from Captain to Rear Admiral (2 star at the time). As more joint staffs became a way of life, the other branches of service began to whine - I mean opine as to the unfairness of this promotional jump. You could be a Navy Captain (O-6) working for an Army Brigadier General (O-7 one star) and your orders came down promoting you to the first admiral rank (the 2 star Rear Admiral) and whahla - you now outrank your boss! The positions of Rear Admiral Lower Half (1 star) and Rear Admiral Upper Half (2 star) were enacted to correct this inequality.

Technical Stuff

JSGME ready. No known issues. Some mods change letterhead, so you might want to install this mod on top of those.

I used Times New Roman for the Font. On most military letterheads I've run across, the complete mailing address was included. Anyone know ComSubPac's or ComSubSoWesPac's World War II mailing address in Pearl/Fremantle?

I chose to leave that off so that the lines could have a larger font and be easier to read as the game blurs it somewhat to give it an aged look. Any thoughts?

At the bottom, I used the Courier Font to give it that typewriter look and did it in bold because the game blurs it for an aged look.

Donner provided me with actual signatures for Lockwood & Christie, so I used PhotoShop to incorporate them onto the documents.

I used the notion of the commander's operations officer signing the patrol orders. In order to get a handwritten look to his signature, I used a program called Signature Creator from erstenware.com. It's freeware and was intended to let you make signatures for your e-mail. Since none of my Fonts looked like handwriting, I dug around on the internet and found some free ones that looked like handwriting. I used a blue ink color to make it show up a little better, did the old cut and paste with PhotoShop and I had a fairly realistic looking signature.

I used the Admiral himself for the orders giving you the boat and then the operations officer for the more routine orders.

Or we could use US Navy HQ in the Pentagon giving command of a boat and then ComSubPac for your operations orders. Any thoughts?

Feel free to alter this mod. Just give credit where it is due. Not to be used for any website that charges a fee. This mod is free for everyone.

I hope you enjoy this simple mod and learned a little about history as well. I encourage you to try and come up with your own. I had zero experience with modding and did a lot of trial and error. Start out with the simple stuff.

Digital_Trucker · 08-09-08, 11:40 AM

Nice work, neighbor

Thanks for the info regarding how you accomplished it, too (especially the part about Signature Creator, looks like a nice bit of freeware to have around).

ReallyDedPoet · 08-09-08, 12:40 PM

Very nice

RDP

Donner · 08-09-08, 01:00 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sea Otter

...
I used the notion of ComSubPac's chief of staff signing for him under the closing "For the Commander". In order to get a handwritten look to his signature, I used a program called Signature Creator from erstenware.com. It's freeware and was intended to let you make signatures for your e-mail. Since none of my Fonts looked like handwriting, I dug around on the internet and found some free ones that looked like handwriting. I used a blue ink color to make it show up a little better, did the old cut and paste with PhotoShop and I had a fairly realistic looking signature.

I used the Admiral himself for the orders giving you the boat and then the chief of staff for the more routine orders.

Just FYI, the Flag Secretary, an officer in charge of all correspondence, signed for the Admiral on most occasions.

Feel free to use these as you see fit.

Once I get more time, I will post more signatures for your use...Christie et al.

Here is Lockwood's signature from a patrol report endorsement...

And here is a signature on behalf of Lockwood from another endorsement (It has been initialed 'ELH', by later Flag Secretary E.L. Hynes)...

Sea Otter · 08-09-08, 04:07 PM

Donner,

Thank you for the info. I really appreciate you taking the time to help me. I didn't know about the flag secretary. I'll look into adjusting my mod.

Right now it seems I spend so much time modding that I never get to play! Anyone else have that problem?

DeepIron · 08-09-08, 07:14 PM

Very nice touch!

Orion2012 · 08-09-08, 09:59 PM

Very Nice.

Sailor Steve · 08-09-08, 11:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sea Otter

Right now it seems I spend so much time modding that I never get to play! Anyone else have that problem?

If you weren't so busy modding you might have time to read more forums...nah, that would take away from game time as well.:rotfl:

Pretty much everybody who has ever modded SH3 or 4 has posted at one time or another that he never gets to play.

Unfortunately, if you have the modding bug it's something you'll just have to live with.

08-10-08, 07:36 AM

Sea Otter,
Great mod, looking forward to downloading it once I get my new rig up and running.
One little detail I noticed, if you are interested in a little feedback:
Naval services abbreviate the rank of Captain as CAPT, whereas CPT was used for ground-pounders

. Spoken the same, but abbreviate differently. And of course, 3 paygrades difference.
Just if you're interested, saw you had the CoS abbreviation down as CPT.

Great work, looking forward to using this one.

Sea Otter · 08-10-08, 07:56 AM

Bosn,

I didn't know that about the difference in abbreviations.

I'm afraid my Army background is showing through!

Thanks for the tip.

I plan on doing some changes now that I've been provided with Lockwood's actual signature and the info about flag secretaries.

PS - My Woo Poo U classmate had a dad who would always make reservations to eat at the naval officer's club near where he was stationed in the Army years ago. He would call and say, "This is Captain (his rank in the Army at the time) So-and-So. I need a reservation. Assuming that he was a naval captain, he would always get a good table and never had to wait. I don't know if the staff at the club ever caught on, but I'm sure he got some stares from all the O-6 captains around him.

Rip · 08-10-08, 05:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sea Otter

Bosn,

I didn't know that about the difference in abbreviations.

I'm afraid my Army background is showing through!

Thanks for the tip.

I plan on doing some changes now that I've been provided with Lockwood's actual signature and the info about flag secretaries.

PS - My Woo Poo U classmate had a dad who would always make reservations to eat at the naval officer's club near where he was stationed in the Army years ago. He would call and say, "This is Captain (his rank in the Army at the time) So-and-So. I need a reservation. Assuming that he was a naval captain, he would always get a good table and never had to wait. I don't know if the staff at the club ever caught on, but I'm sure he got some stares from all the O-6 captains around him.

Probably really sucked for the navy O-6 that happened to reserve a spot a the Army O club. Probably would think he was getting a ****ty table because the don't like sailors.

Donner · 08-10-08, 09:48 PM

Here are some more signatures taken from patrol report endorsements...

E.R. Swinburne, Flag Secretary for Adm. English...

E.L. Hynes, 2nd., Flag Secretary to Adm Lockwood...

Adm. R.W. Christie...

Admiral Chester Nimitz...

And for informational purposes only... the last page of the report on the loss of the USS Wahoo. Note the letter head of ComSubPac and the typewriter font.

Sea Otter · 08-11-08, 06:48 AM

Once again, thank you Donner!

I really appreciate you taking the time to help me refine my mod.

That's one of the great things about Subsim. I've posted 2 mods so far and have had a lot of great feedback from folks who want to help make them better by providing historical insight or examples.

In turn, I'm able to do some adjusting and offer the community a better mod.

Thanks!

Rip · 08-11-08, 06:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sea Otter

Once again, thank you Donner!

I really appreciate you taking the time to help me refine my mod.

That's one of the great things about Subsim. I've posted 2 mods so far and have had a lot of great feedback from folks who want to help make them better by providing historical insight or examples.

In turn, I'm able to do some adjusting and offer the community a better mod.

Thanks!

SSN-662 or SS-254?

Rip

Sea Otter · 08-11-08, 07:26 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rip

SSN-662 or SS-254?

Rip

Rip,

I take it you are asking about my quote. It's from the SS-254 Gurnard.

I used it due to my penchant for attracting depth charges when I play SH4. It reminds me about the guys who did this for a living back in the day without the benefit of reloading a game when they got into trouble.

I can only imagine what it must have really been like. They have my deepest respect and gratitude.

08-09-08, 11:21 AM	#1
Sea Otter Watch Join Date: Jul 2008 Location: Alabama Posts: 25 Downloads: 49 Uploads: 0	[REL] ComSubPac & ComSubSoWesPac Letterheads Mod Greetings, Subsimmer's! I learned a great deal by making this simple mod. Now I understand why modder's use a [WIP] (Work in Progress) announcement when they do a mod. I posted my mod and within hours members of SUBSIM were sending me some great suggestions and information. Donner, one of our moderators, even sent me images of actual documents with the admirals' signatures on them! I'm pretty sure this will be my last version. If you downloaded one of the earlier ones and have to download again, I am sorry. I know now that I am a "rivet counter" and could spend hours researching. Thanks to the community, I'm satisfied with this mod's latest release. This mod was inspired by Kapt.Klaus's Orders Document mod and GREATLY improved by info provided by Donner. Also, thanks to Bosn for telling me the Navy uses "CAPT" for captain instead of "CPT". In fact, when I began playing SH4, I was looking to add little touches of realism to the game. His was one of the first mods I downloaded. Thanks KPT.Klaus for allowing me to use your work as an inspiration! This mod comes in two versions. The first is for Subsimmer's who play a lot out of Pearl, Midway, etc. I chose RADM Lockwood to be the ComSubPac represented here. The ComSubPac at the begining of the war in the PTO was RADM T.T. Withers. He is noted for loading his sub commanders up in an airplane and showing them how visible their submerged subs were even at deeper depths. He was followed by RADM Robert English who was tragically killed in a plane crash. The last ComSubPac during the war was RADM Lockwood who served the longest in this capacity. Lockwood also wrote the book, Sink 'em All! For these reasons, I chose him to be the ComSubPac represented on the letterhead. I was reading ADM I. J. Galantin's book, Taker Her Deep and found that the distinguished Sub Commander, Richard G. Voge, served as Lockwood's Operations Officer, so I chose him to be the Ops Officer represented in the mod. Here's the FileFront link: http://files.filefront.com/Pacific+L.../fileinfo.html The second version is for Subsimmer's who play a lot out of Australia. I chose RADM Christie to be the ComSubSoWesPac represented here. RADM Lockwood was also a good candidate due to his fame, but he got bumped to be ComSubPac after RADM English was killed in a plane crash. Since I was using Lockwood in my mod for ComSubPac, I went with Christie. Christie wasn't without his controversies (he helped design and develope the MK VI Magnetic Detonator as well as the MK XIV Torpedo and got into it pretty heavily with his boss Admiral Thomas Kincaid over a lot of issues), but you gotta love an admiral who went out on a real patrol or two! I did a little digging on the internet and found that CPT Murray T. Tichenor served as Christie's Operations Officer, so I chose him to be the Ops Officer in the mod. There is an interesting bit about him in the book, Australian Commandos by A.B. Feuer. Evidently Tichenor went along for the ride when the USS Harder was sent on a rescue mission to retrieve a commando unit. Here's the FileFront Link: http://files.filefront.com/Southwest.../fileinfo.html Historical Tidbit In digging around, I found that the Commanders, Submarine Force, Pacific and Southwest Pacific (ComSubPac & ComSubSoWesPac) were rear admirals. It was interesting to note that at the time, there was no "one star" admiral's rank. You went from Captain to Rear Admiral (2 star at the time). As more joint staffs became a way of life, the other branches of service began to whine - I mean opine as to the unfairness of this promotional jump. You could be a Navy Captain (O-6) working for an Army Brigadier General (O-7 one star) and your orders came down promoting you to the first admiral rank (the 2 star Rear Admiral) and whahla - you now outrank your boss! The positions of Rear Admiral Lower Half (1 star) and Rear Admiral Upper Half (2 star) were enacted to correct this inequality. Technical Stuff JSGME ready. No known issues. Some mods change letterhead, so you might want to install this mod on top of those. I used Times New Roman for the Font. On most military letterheads I've run across, the complete mailing address was included. Anyone know ComSubPac's or ComSubSoWesPac's World War II mailing address in Pearl/Fremantle? I chose to leave that off so that the lines could have a larger font and be easier to read as the game blurs it somewhat to give it an aged look. Any thoughts? At the bottom, I used the Courier Font to give it that typewriter look and did it in bold because the game blurs it for an aged look. Donner provided me with actual signatures for Lockwood & Christie, so I used PhotoShop to incorporate them onto the documents. I used the notion of the commander's operations officer signing the patrol orders. In order to get a handwritten look to his signature, I used a program called Signature Creator from erstenware.com. It's freeware and was intended to let you make signatures for your e-mail. Since none of my Fonts looked like handwriting, I dug around on the internet and found some free ones that looked like handwriting. I used a blue ink color to make it show up a little better, did the old cut and paste with PhotoShop and I had a fairly realistic looking signature. I used the Admiral himself for the orders giving you the boat and then the operations officer for the more routine orders. Or we could use US Navy HQ in the Pentagon giving command of a boat and then ComSubPac for your operations orders. Any thoughts? Feel free to alter this mod. Just give credit where it is due. Not to be used for any website that charges a fee. This mod is free for everyone. I hope you enjoy this simple mod and learned a little about history as well. I encourage you to try and come up with your own. I had zero experience with modding and did a lot of trial and error. Start out with the simple stuff. __________________ Sea Otter Woop "When you shoot at a destroyer and miss, it's like hit'in a wildcat in the ass with a banjo." Chief Offier Steward Dogan USS Gurnard Last edited by Sea Otter; 08-13-08 at 07:51 PM.

08-09-08, 11:40 AM	#2
Digital_Trucker Silent Hunter Join Date: Jul 2007 Location: The Peach State Posts: 4,171 Downloads: 141 Uploads: 10	Nice work, neighbor Thanks for the info regarding how you accomplished it, too (especially the part about Signature Creator, looks like a nice bit of freeware to have around). __________________ RSM-GIEP-Killflags-LV Tribute-Playable Elco __Peace be with you, Dave.

08-09-08, 12:40 PM	#3
ReallyDedPoet Canadian Wolf Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: Canada. The one and only, East Coast Posts: 10,888 Downloads: 946 Uploads: 5	Very nice RDP __________________ Back in the Day

08-09-08, 04:07 PM	#5
Sea Otter Watch Join Date: Jul 2008 Location: Alabama Posts: 25 Downloads: 49 Uploads: 0	Donner, You're the Best! Donner, Thank you for the info. I really appreciate you taking the time to help me. I didn't know about the flag secretary. I'll look into adjusting my mod. Right now it seems I spend so much time modding that I never get to play! Anyone else have that problem? __________________ Sea Otter Woop "When you shoot at a destroyer and miss, it's like hit'in a wildcat in the ass with a banjo." Chief Offier Steward Dogan USS Gurnard

08-09-08, 07:14 PM	#6
DeepIron Sea Lord Join Date: Aug 2007 Location: Too far from the Pacific right now... Posts: 1,634 Downloads: 0 Uploads: 0	Very nice touch! __________________ RFB / RSRDC Beta Tester RFB / RSRDC Modding Forum: http://forum.kickinbak.com/index.php RFB Top Post link: http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=125529 RFB Loadout: RFB_V1.52_102408: RFB_V1.52_Patch_111608: RSRDC_RFBv15_V396

08-09-08, 09:59 PM	#7
Orion2012 Commodore Join Date: Jul 2008 Posts: 611 Downloads: 0 Uploads: 0	Very Nice.

08-10-08, 07:36 AM	#9
Bosn Stowaway Posts: n/a Downloads: Uploads:	Sea Otter, Great mod, looking forward to downloading it once I get my new rig up and running. One little detail I noticed, if you are interested in a little feedback: Naval services abbreviate the rank of Captain as CAPT, whereas CPT was used for ground-pounders . Spoken the same, but abbreviate differently. And of course, 3 paygrades difference. Just if you're interested, saw you had the CoS abbreviation down as CPT. Great work, looking forward to using this one.

08-10-08, 07:56 AM	#10
Sea Otter Watch Join Date: Jul 2008 Location: Alabama Posts: 25 Downloads: 49 Uploads: 0	Bosn, I didn't know that about the difference in abbreviations. I'm afraid my Army background is showing through! Thanks for the tip. I plan on doing some changes now that I've been provided with Lockwood's actual signature and the info about flag secretaries. PS - My Woo Poo U classmate had a dad who would always make reservations to eat at the naval officer's club near where he was stationed in the Army years ago. He would call and say, "This is Captain (his rank in the Army at the time) So-and-So. I need a reservation. Assuming that he was a naval captain, he would always get a good table and never had to wait. I don't know if the staff at the club ever caught on, but I'm sure he got some stares from all the O-6 captains around him. __________________ Sea Otter Woop "When you shoot at a destroyer and miss, it's like hit'in a wildcat in the ass with a banjo." Chief Offier Steward Dogan USS Gurnard

08-10-08, 09:48 PM	#12
Donner Officer Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: On patrol... Posts: 244 Downloads: 113 Uploads: 0	More Signatures Here are some more signatures taken from patrol report endorsements... E.R. Swinburne, Flag Secretary for Adm. English... E.L. Hynes, 2nd., Flag Secretary to Adm Lockwood... Adm. R.W. Christie... Admiral Chester Nimitz... And for informational purposes only... the last page of the report on the loss of the USS Wahoo. Note the letter head of ComSubPac and the typewriter font. __________________ "Sink 'Em All!"- Uncle Charlie....."Angriff, Ran, Versenken!"- Onkel Karl

08-11-08, 06:48 AM	#13
Sea Otter Watch Join Date: Jul 2008 Location: Alabama Posts: 25 Downloads: 49 Uploads: 0	Once again, thank you Donner! I really appreciate you taking the time to help me refine my mod. That's one of the great things about Subsim. I've posted 2 mods so far and have had a lot of great feedback from folks who want to help make them better by providing historical insight or examples. In turn, I'm able to do some adjusting and offer the community a better mod. Thanks! __________________ Sea Otter Woop "When you shoot at a destroyer and miss, it's like hit'in a wildcat in the ass with a banjo." Chief Offier Steward Dogan USS Gurnard