[REQ] New Object desperately needed.

[tater]

A REEF.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/43/NPS-truk-lagoon2.jpg
That is Truk. See what is missing in SH4? The REEFS. We need a few simple objects. Flat on the bottom, kinda blob shaped, in a long gentle arc, kinda wide. Can't be too hard, or too many polys to make). At least one pretty long (5000m? more?), one medium (2000m?), one smaller (500m?). The entirety of the detail would be the texture map.

You'd place them like a port facility, but with a negative altitude to be underwater (assumong that works). The tickness would be designed to match the typical shallows in game that result in 30-50ft below the keel. They'd be thick enough that a sub could not go over the reef at all.

http://web.umr.edu/~rogersda/military_service/Reef%20at%20Midway.jpg

tater

[akdavis]

lol, I've been contimplating the same thing. The trick is having it as real object that you can collide with, but making it not hog more resources than the bizarro giant rocks/alien plants covering on the ocean floor. Everything that is put to that nonsense should be redirected to real barrier reefs. It just ain't the Pacific without them. It makes Truk in particular more than a little bit absurd.

One big roadblock is that I can't really see how it could be made visible from the surface. The game has no real code for the sea surface breaking against something (just check out the "beaches" and compare to Pacific Fighters) and the transparency doesn't extend to anything other than ships (and even that brings my system to its knees).

[CCIP]

I believe something along the same lines as harbor structures would be perfect here!

[W_clear]

I need ti too .lol:D

[donut]

Been there twice in SHIV,once assigned patrol assignment in 1942. 6th or 7th patrol out of Brisbane. Nothing but fisherman,I did take fire from a shore battery,but no war ships at Moan,& no harbor facilities yet? Nice detailed map,Quite accurate.
Would expect some action there in 1944 big naval hideout,before Carrier air raid attack. I used south pass in one of my many infiltrations in SHI,It was a good, harbor raid.As many as 5DDs patrolling Atoll area. many large warship @ anchor. SHIV unknown?

[tater]

I did a little test. port facility might work, you can set the minimum height and it takes a negative number. Alternately, the land objects like coastal batteries automatically place at the right depth! (useful for finding out the exact dept, BTW).

The trick is to make as few such objects as possible 5, 10, maybe even 15 mile streches would work.

I really think this is a critcal addition, without it any realistic Truk facility could be creamed at max range by a nearly random spread of torps at max range. They'd never know what hit them.

tater

[CaptainCox]

Maybe this can be of use here "Map1 -Map2" in

C:\Program Files\Ubisoft\Silent Hunter 4 Wolves of the Pacific\Data\Terrain\Maps\Map2

its RAW files that controls the depth and stuff on the main map. Only a theory... i show you...

http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a138/CaptainCox/map333.jpg

The light gray color is sort a shallow water, the darker is water, beige (not really visible here) is land.

More hints here
http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=111999
and here
http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=112213&highlight=format

These threads don't explain exactly how to do an atoll or a reef but if you try it out I think you might get the drift of things. I found this searching for something completely different. At least this will show up in game on the NavMap, if its actually there in 3D I never tested...but I guess it would be as the Map1-2 RAW sets the altitude of stuff...anyhow check it out it might be a lead.

[tater]

So the idea is that you could paint a shade of gray slightly lighter than the shallow water, and this file actually determines the real depth in the game?

And if you used the "land colors" you could paint whole new islands, etc?

[CaptainCox]

It looks like that on the "NAVMAP" yes...I never saw it in the actual 3D world as i was after a totally different function (displaying the "folded" navmap that comes with the game) It does create new atolls and stuff. It looks very similar to this
but controlled.

http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=112508

But again, I never checked in the 3D world if it has any effect.

[tater]

You'd need to make sure PS opened it just the right way, and saved the same way. It offers me some options when I open the map. Oddly, even though the file label is 21600x10800, it opens it as 10800x10800.

I zoomed in on Truk, and I didn't see nearly the detail required, it was very pixelated which was odd for a 200+ MB image.

[CaptainCox]

You should be able to "type in " any res you want opening that. So even if it says open in 10800x10800, you can simply type in "21600x10800". Ofcourse you must resize it to the original "10800x10800" when saving.

To get the color you should follow the steps as described in the link I posted previously.
You can open it with PS, you have to select open as and choose photoshop raw, in the dialog change width and height to match the file you're opening (4320x2160 or 21600x10800), change channels count to 1, depth must be 8 bits.
The image is a grayscale one, to see it in colour you need to change the format to indexed (menu->Image->mode->indexed color), then goto menu->Image->mode->color table, hit load and select terrain.act from the terrain/pal folder, in order to give it more contrast you need to work with the palette, not the image as it could have undesirable results, once you're done save the palette overwriting the original one.
Ref

Now i found that you cant save it correctly once you have gone from "Multichanel" - "Grayscale" - "Indexed Color", it will save it in LIGHTER! colors. So this you can only use to test.

You have to sort of figure what kind of "GRAY" does what you want in the "Multichanel" and save it directly from there, but this "GRAY" can be tested and checked using the "Index Color" mode (but only for testing purposes as I said)

But the more I think about this the more unlikely it is that this actually changes the real 3D world, it will show up on the map SURE! but...give it a go and tell us...

Ahhhh also...this will be a hell of a heavy mod if you get it going as you need BOTH! Map files for this...

[Chock]

Multichannel is only really intended to identify spot colours in a received duotone image, so it's not surprising that it could have an adverse effect on palettes.

[tater]

Maybe the object could have a wake of some kind to make it look like surf?

I don't care if it doesn't show, I just want the atolls blocked, that's their entire value as anchorages.

[Chock]

yup, the Truk atolls being missing is a big disappointment, as the passages are real interception choke points, which would have made for some good tactical challenges in real life