Medals

[Sub Sailor]

How was the awarding of medals in 1.7 and 1.9 decided Trigger Maru? In reading Clairs' book Silent Victory, Slade Cutter, and the book about Admiral Fluckey "The Galloping Ghost", actually any of the top Commanders of Subs in WWII recieved madal for a lot less that TM allows. I am sure High Medals, CMH, Navy Cross, Silver Star and Bronze Star were awarded for far less than TM does.
Can that be Changed?
I have sunk over 40K in a patrol and received the Navy Commendation.


Ron Banks MMCM(SS), USN(Ret)

[CapnScurvy]

Hi Ron, to try and answer your question regarding how TM 1.9 calculates awards it's partly a hard coded stock process and a modded workaround to offset what we can't fix.

The stock process has a preset basis for figuring awards. After a lot of trial and error (actual sinking targets then crash driving to kill oneself to determine the awards received, restarting the same mission or career, then increasing the total tonnage sunk to find a new higher award threshold) it was determined that several factors come into play when calculating the award given. The pure total tonnage sunk plays a part, however the "Quality" of ship makes a difference also. In other words, one warship can be worth more than (say) 3 freighters even if the three freighters give a total tonnage greater than the warship. There is also a tier effect within the warship group, so a BB will be calculated higher than a DD. The number of patrols seems to make a difference as well. The higher experienced a Captain, the larger this preset basis for calculating awards will be. As I said earlier, the figures that come into play are mostly hard coded within the game. There isn't much we can do about how this game sometimes adds 2+2=5.

What we can do is manipulate how the game thinks it's presenting awards for the overall system to better simulate an accurate award received. For instance when you look under the hood of the stock game award system it's first tier award should be the Patrol Star (Bronze Star Medal). HOWEVER, the game files actually has the Medal of Valor (Congressional Medal of Honor) in the Patrol Star placement order, WITH the Victory Cross (Navy Cross) actually being awarded in the Captains Award Box. What the hell is that!!! Again, this is for the first tier award!! It's been well known the medals have been a screwed pooch from day one and with 5 patches (including the U-Boat Missions Addon) it's never been corrected. What we have done is figure the correct order the awards should be presented, then put into place awards that are fitting for the tier basis who's calculation we can't do anything about.

I choose to use the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal as the First tier award simply because everyone serving within the theatre received one. I took some license using it since it really didn't get awarded until after the war. The same with the Second tier award the Navy Commendation Award. It wasn't commissioned until 1943 (and only as a ribbon at the time). A description is as follows: "The Commendation Medal is a mid-level United States award/decoration which is presented for sustained acts of heroism or meritorious service. For valorous actions in direct contact with an enemy force, but of a lesser degree than required for the award of the Bronze Star Medal".

The Bronze Star Medal, Silver Star, and Navy Cross were moved up in order simply because the idea of receiving a Congressional Medal of Honor for nothing more than sinking tonnage seemed (to me) to degrade the actual real world award. The CMOH removal along with the Distinguished Service Medal speak for their selves. "The Navy Distinguished Service Medal is bestowed upon members of the Navy or Marine Corps who distinguish themselves by exceptionally meritorious service to the United States goverment in a duty of great responsibility.The term “great responsibility” implies senior military responsibility, and the decoration is normally only bestowed to senior Navy Flag and Marine Corps General Officers. The decoration is rarely awarded to enlisted personnel, and then only to those who hold extremely senior enlisted positions such as the Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy". This award would have never been given to a lowly sub Captain, yet alone a torpedo room Machinest.

So the long story short, the specific medals are as reasonably presented as they can be within the corrected order. It's just we can't change the parameters the game sets for when an award threshold is reached through its prefixed basis of calculation.

[Jten]

Does that include the NUMBER of medals awarded to the crew at end of patrol?

I understand the inclusion of a Service Award (APCM) among the other Decorations and your use of it is not unhistorical since while the actual medal was not designed and issued till post war, the ribbon colors were created and ribbons for the APCM was issued during the war. (Most of the awards issued in WW2 for the US were in ribbon form. War metal shortages and all that.)

What I have been wanting to do is increase the number of the APCM given so everyone could have one by 2-3 patrols. 30 days in theater is all that was required and Hawaii was 'in theater' for the award. Most sailors would have qualified for it before leaving on patrol and would have received additional devices on it for each campaign.

I have considered testing a manually edited starting crew that had one on each crew member. In that case, additional awards would only be needed for 'new' crewmen and the current game issue quantities might suffice to have one on everyone by war's end.

Everybody has their own pet peeves and having an APCM on everybody is mine. That and Sampans.

BTW: Great medals mods. I was happy with stock SH4 except for the medals and it was the lure of your mod that made me go to 1.5 now I'm RFB+RSRD and your medals mod is still the 'cherry' on top of the 'whip cream'.

[CapnScurvy]

Does that include the NUMBER of medals awarded to the crew at end of patrol?

Yes Jten it does. The crew medals are even more of a mystery than the Captain's. Again, their criteria is hard coded. Outside of calculating tonnage sunk and successful completion of tasks I haven't got a clue of what, how, or why an award is issued for a crewman. I have seen if some compartment catastrophe takes place you may see a dead crewman, or Purple Hearts are available for the crew when you reach port. The only parameter we can tinker with is the "who" (the actual award) part of the game not the what, how, or why.

What I have been wanting to do is increase the number of the APCM given so everyone could have one by 2-3 patrols. 30 days in theater is all that was required and Hawaii was 'in theater' for the award. Most sailors would have qualified for it before leaving on patrol and would have received additional devices on it for each campaign.

At one time I had the Submarine Dolphins as the first tier award. But, without being able to change the criteria from "tonnage sunk and completion of tasks", the idea of a time in service award (or in the Dolphins case, a completion of knowledge tests) just couldn't be implimented correctly.

There are six levels of awards (tiers) even though I don't consider the Purple Heart a tier. The PH is correctly issued using the criteria of death or injury, although the stock award was the Submarine Service Medal (Distinguished Service Medal) and not the Wounded Medal!! The point is these six levels have a hard coded criteria which we don't have access to. :88)

[Jten]

Thanks, I'll have to put my thinking cap on.

[CapnScurvy]

Jten, this is just a passing thought (like a fart) but, what about the "special abilities" part in the game? I've not spent time thinking about this aspect of the game. Maybe there's a way to manipulate their files to add a "service award" to the game?! I wouldn't know where to find the right files; perhaps the Captain's and Crewmen's .UPC files for starters. Perhaps those files aren’t as restricted to mod as the medal criteria. You would have to perhaps change some things in the [G61 Ixxx] menu_1024_768.ini file (I think this is the section for dealing with the crew regarding special abilities). I know that's where you mod the crews medals for display in the Crew Management screen.

It’s just a thought.

[Jten]

Sorry for the delay responding. Wife's been at the hospital getting some cancer cut out.
Actually I modded the starting crew file last week. (Data>UPCData>UPCCrewData>Crewmembers)
I added the APCM to all crew except the Ensign and Seaman Apprentice entries (except the SA that starts with an Engineer skill)
I started a new game and everybody started with the award (except as noted above).
I sailed and put back into port. New available replacement crew also now had the award except as noted above.
I loaded a save game from before the modification. The crew's awards had not changed (everyone did not get one since the game only references the starting roster when the campaign starts) but I also DID NOT get a CTD so the 'tweak' seems to not be a conflict maker.
I'm currently playing both saves to see if an Ensign or Seaman Apprentice crewman magically gets the award when promoted at sea or if not. I am thinking they will not.
So far it seems to make me happy. New ensigns or SA will have to 'Earn' the APCM and the game levels of 2-3 APCM per 'good' patrol should suffice. Everyone else will start with one.

On another point, I have noticed the APCM small graphic (the one that gets added to the crew display) has a small drop out of color in the drape. (CrewSystemsManagement .DDS file) I'm a graphic designer so it caught my eye and popped it open in Photoshop and was going to correct it when I thought 'Hey, maybe there's a reason the Cap'n did that' so I held off.

I have also wondered about the 'renown' rating. Most mods did away with using that but since the game engine is set to use that variable I have been trying to see if i can reuse that for some other effect.

[CapnScurvy]

First off Jten, I wish your wife the best in recovering from her surgery. Real life issues are always priority one!! She needs the attention; hey today is Valentine's Day so don't forget, I'm sure she won't (nor should she)!!

On another point, I have noticed the APCM small graphic (the one that gets added to the crew display) has a small drop out of color in the drape. (CrewSystemsManagement .DDS file) I'm a graphic designer so it caught my eye and popped it open in Photoshop and was going to correct it when I thought 'Hey, maybe there's a reason the Cap'n did that' so I held off.


Well it's not a good reason!! To say I'm an expert is a stretch when using graphics!! I know, every time I worked with the images I would lose clarity.
I suspect it has something to do with the particular file type I'm using or trying to save (either with the particular medal image or the way I'm saving the whole CrewSystemsManagement.dds image). I don't know if it's because the Image "mode" is set to "Indexed Color" or "RGB Color" and this makes a difference in keeping the images clarity? Or, is it the process of resizing the medal image (to get it down to the small size the CrewSystemsManagement.dds medals use)? I wish I knew because I've seen it too, I'm just not sure what to do (the only graphics work I've every done has been through game modding; to say the least, it's self taught and it shows). When I made the AOB Calculator mod I literally cut and pasted the dials bearing figures onto a circle, and then scanned the image which allowed me to use Photoshop to clean up the image. All without really knowing what the heck I'm doing. That's not exactly good graphic design techniques!! If you know a couple of techniques I should use please help. I'm like a "finish" carpenter using a 3 pound sledge for a hammer!!
I have also wondered about the 'renown' rating. Most mods did away with using that but since the game engine is set to use that variable I have been trying to see if I can reuse that for some other effect.
That's a thought too!! Renown does indeed play a role in the overall ratings of individual crewmen, or the entire compartment as well. Putting higher ranked renowned crew into specific positions raises the bar for efficiency. Just what or how I don't know.


Best regards to your wife.

[Jten]

Thank you for your kind thoughts, she's doing well. According to the doctor it appears to be the 'best' kind of cancer to have if one has to have it.
As far as keeping quality in Photoshop, every time you use a 'transform' effect it resamples a raster image (fancy word for any bitmap image...jpeg,gif,tiff...etc) and you lose data in the image. If you need to play with an image to get it 'just right' always make a layer copy, mess with that, then go back to the original and make all your transforms (scale,rotation,skew...etc) in one action for the least amount of resample. Jpeg files are very lossy. One should never resave a jpeg as a jpeg because you lose more info each time. Unfortunately computers love jpegs.
Indexed colors are reduced to 256 so if you have more than that in the image some will be 'thrown out'. For computer work try using the 'save for web and devices' save option. It gives you more options and previews it before you save.
The problem is worse if you make a small image (few pixels) by taking a large nice image(lots of pixels) and sizing it down. The resample keeps the color balance by retaining the predominate colors and throwing out the rest. A small image just needs to be recreated.

I'll pop open the dds file and see what I can do. Your large medal work is good. What dds export settings does the game want?

[virtualpender]

CapnScurvy - what about removing the Asia-Pacific Campaign medal, bumping the remaining medals down a tier, and adding the Presidential Unit Citation as the new highest award? That might start giving a few more Bronze Stars to share among the crew.

[Jten]

CapnScurvy
I've fixed the small APCM. Works in my game but I'm not sure which export file type is best. I'm making it a .dds with the ARGB 16BPP unsigned 1.5.5.5 setting but my file size is about twice your original and it may not need to be that verbose. I need to know which setting you used or if you want me to send you my .psd for your evaluation.

[CapnScurvy]

Thanks for getting back to me Jten. Sorry about the length of time since you posted, I've had other fish to fry lately.

For the CrewSystemsManagement image the game uses the .dds file type, a DXT5 file format, no MipMap, overall size is 2048x512 (that makes an image size of 1024KB over all). I wouldn't change these parameters (although I may have made the mistake of allowing MipMap production to have slipped in when saving, that was before I knew what they did and how to use them. Depending on when I made the file and if I updated the mod to correct this?! Sooooo, that can make a file larger than needed).

We used to think the .dds format took precedent over a .tga file, (and it does most of the time) but there are some instances this is not the case. Regarding the CrewSystemsManagement.dds file there are no .tga's for this file so what you have is what you get. As I said above, try to mimick whatever the game has as a stock image format, and try to keep the image size as small as the stock files. This game runs on a thread away from a CTD all on it's own, adding extra file sizes will really add to the instabilities of the game.

Thanks for the insight on dealing with the washing out of the original image when saving. Right off, I don't remember the size of the individual medals in the CrewSystemsManagement.dds image but their small. Finding a small image that one doesn't need to shrink down is a problem.

Yes I'd like to see your work.

[Jten]

DXT5
Well, butter my behind and call me a biscuit.
That is a lossy format so there is some compression going on but it has other advantages in the 3D world. Unfortunately, DXT5 encodes in 4x4 pixel blocks to a limit of 64 bits of color data per block. Push too much data into that block and stuff goes out the window. At this time I don't know the Alpha Channel boundaries. I have made a rough guess at them and made some of the medals a little larger (and thus modified the Alpha Channel) and they seem to show correctly but I'd like to test that a little more.
The medals with few colors like the Navy Cross or wide stripes like the Silver Star do better. The thin 1 pixel width stripes of the APCM are causing the problem (especially the blue and red stripes) and when I exported as that, my nice APCM colors went back to the mud brown stripe on the left hand side. But I have worked around that but it's a little higher at 1366KB instead of 1024kb. It seems to render OK on mine but I'm running dual cores. That is with a rework of all the US medals for sharper colors and details.
OK, as far as DDS files and TGA, some other game engines would in higher detail modes bypass the DDS and load from TGA depending upon a override setting. It's possible that the SH IV graphics that have DDS and TGA are using the TGA for higher graphics settings and the DDs for all other. The items being used from crewsystemsmanagement.dds are hardly high rez so that's probably why there is no setup for higher rez TGA.

I'd like to show you what I've got but there is a better DDS compression tool than the Photoshop plugins and there is a manual compression prep by loading one color channel into the alpha before export. I'd like to try those and test them in game a bit.

[CapnScurvy]

A "lossy"?

You graphic guys have the lingo!! I've called it something else (like #qo$"*F#t) or something like that when I would see the outcome!! Yep, the APCM seems to take the worst hit in quality when using PhotoShops Nvidia plugin for a DXT5 file format. I've noticed an .tga save does a pretty good job in holding the original quality BUT the game uses a .dds image for this particular CrewSystemsManagement image (no .tga at all). When I spoke about the game choosing which image to use (a .tga or .dds) when there is listed both in a particular file (with the same name), the .dds file usually wins out. I've checked this by marking one image with a red stripe through it, the other with a blue. The .dds file seems to hold precedence over the .tga almost every time. I believe this is a hard coded process since the menu_1024_768.ini file lists the .tga almost every time but the .dds image is the one shown in game.

You thought maybe the .tga is used for the high end graphics, (and you may be correct) but I don't think so. After a while of looking at how the game is cobbled together, these files and menu_1024_768 references (I believe) are just the "leftovers" of the SHIII game. The devs didn't have time to clean up their rewrites when Ubisoft cracked the whip on them to get SH4 out the door.

That's why the menu_1024_768 is such a mess when you look at it. There are soooooo many overrides and "inactive" parameters that one can barely understand what the heck is going on. There are images and files that were never used in the SH4 game (even with the "U-Boat Missions Addon") that just don't need to be there. Like the Data\Menu\Gui\Medals\"SH4Medals.dds" image. The stock game doesn't use these medals. This image was left over by the devs either by mistake (they just didn't have the time to use them), or they simply knew we modders would find them and put a mod together using them. I hope for those that look forward to the SH5 edition it gets a better shake than what this American version of an older German game engine received.

Speaking of the menu_1024_768.ini file. You had better get your noodle wrapped around a tutorial to understand what and how things work in the game. Placing images in game (at least the 2D ones) is done through this file. If you have an image that's too large or needs to be moved around a bit the menu_1024_768.ini file is the place to do it. This tutorial is the "holy grail" for understanding where and how things get placed in game. You can find it here in this THREAD. (http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?p=496713) I wish there was more to it, but understanding what zAMBONI put together has helped me greatly! Just a little light reading for you this weekend.

[Jten]

Thanks for the link. That seems to be what I was looking for. :yeah: