Random environment generator

[Hawk66]

Hi Guys,

I was thinking if it's worthy to create a random environment generator (external tool). Basically it could scan the scenario file (it's just a text file, so it's easy), copy it and alter the environmental settings (probably apart of SSP). Examples are time, month, sea state, wind regions etc.

To make it more realistic it could read the LATLONG coordinates to produce a realistic weather for a specific region (which could be conifgured by a XML file to avoid the effort of creating an UI).

Finally, it could append the mission description by giving some hints about the weather, time etc.

Of course, such a tool makes only sense for scenarios, which are highly replayable and dynamic.

What's your opinion?

Very good idea indeed, but other than external tool, I would like this if possible to be implemented in-game menu, but that would probably go against SCS not to modify any file from the executables...
If I only had a hurricane in the game...

[OneShot]

Thats a great idea. Btw. I recall that Kage (MaHuJa) mentioned he was working on a similar tool himself - maybe you should try to contact him and see whats his status is.

Cheers
OS

[Dr.Sid]

It does not really have to be part of the game. DW switches to background nicely, so it's even better to have it outside the game. I hate I have to quit DW mission editor to play the mission.

Good idea indeed. I'd like to have something like quick mission, but better. Better selection of opponents, and especially weather and time.

[LuftWolf]

Originally Posted by GakunGak

If I only had a hurricane in the game...

You can have any weather you want.

Go into any mission file with a text editor, and change the environmental settings to anything you desire. You can edit the wind speed to 10000kts, for example, and maybe go to sea state 8? 10?

Try it yourself, it's quite entertaining!

Cheers,
David

[To be]

It is . I just tried a sea state 104 in the FFG, which is happy that DW doesn't model flooding.

[SeaQueen]

Originally Posted by Hawk66

What's your opinion?

I like the idea of being able to add random environmental features to a scenario. I frequently find myself making variations of scenarios where I change time of day, weather, etc. from a baseline where the environment is assumed to be basically benign. Randomness is a nice way of avoiding having to ask myself "do I feel like it's a rainy day today?"

[Janus]

Somebody whose name I cannot recall has made a similar thing for SHIII, an external .NET stuff tool which reads and writes the campaign file. It is totally feasable, you just have to start

What I believe would be great if not only the weather would be changed but also use the tool to spawn neturla shipping in the area of operations.

[SeaQueen]

Originally Posted by Janus

What I believe would be great if not only the weather would be changed but also use the tool to spawn neturla shipping in the area of operations.

That can already be done using the scenario editor. You just have to take the time to put it in.

[Dr.Sid]

Originally Posted by SeaQueen

That can already be done using the scenario editor. You just have to take the time to put it in.

You just can't play missions you create by yourself .. whole fun of subs is 'you don't know'. Sure you can use random boxes but that can generate stupid missions time to time.

[Janus]

Originally Posted by Dr.Sid

You just can't play missions you create by yourself .. whole fun of subs is 'you don't know'. Sure you can use random boxes but that can generate stupid missions time to time.

Of course a mission generated by a tool is very unlikely to be as tense and have a good storyline like a carefully built manual mission.
The first post was about an existing scenario which should be scanned and the weather, time and sea state altered randomly - at least tha's how I have understood it.

I don't know much about the mission editor and how scenario files are structured but I could not think of a problem why it should not be possible to add some neutral shipping and so on to a scenario with a tool. If you have a halfway comfortable user interface where you can enter more or less detailed parameters (like: I have this mission near the coast so add me 2 - 4 neutral ships of the class freighter, sailboat or fish trawler which transit along the AO and for a scenario with no coast you can select not to generate ships that would stay near the shore...)

[Dr.Sid]

And bio contacts ! Gee there is too little of them

[Hawk66]

I've thought about myself to create an enhanced quick mission generator some months ago, but I've skipped the idea due to lack of time.

I think it's possible but very, very time intensive to create such a generator which creates interesting scenarions and not only the usual 'Hunt that submarine etc.' stuff. You would need an API/SDK for DW (BTW, it would be sooo good to have one, look at Civilization 4) to do automatic tests/background 'playing' so a learning algorithm (AI) could adapt the mission generating. Manual adjusting would be very time intensive. Perhaps a combination of a predefined dynamic mission with some random altering by using an external tool would be the best ?


Ok, I see some interest in such a tool (environment generator) and I think I'll do it, because I wanna play anyway a little with .NET and it seem's a good and not to big application to start with. But don't expect any results soon - I've a time-intensive job like the majority of you, too

[Dr.Sid]

'Hunt that sub' would be pretty OK for me. But DW quick missions can't do that. It can only 'hunt some sub' .. you can't choose allies, you can't choose opponents, you can't choose conditions. All these would be simple to achieve by mission generation (modification) only.

[SeaQueen]

Originally Posted by Dr.Sid

You just can't play missions you create by yourself .. whole fun of subs is 'you don't know'. Sure you can use random boxes but that can generate stupid missions time to time.

I disagree. Rarely is there a time in ASW where you're REALLY in the dark. Intelligence from various sources gives one at least a rough idea of where there might be a submarine geographically. Additionally, the physics of relative motion imposes other constraints upon submarines. Random boxes and dynamic locations applied smartly are all that's really needed to make a great mission that one can play over and over again. My biggest gripe, though, is that typically people don't make them large enough, or else put them in all the wrong places. Scenario designers want a lot of theatre in their scenarios and I think end up "fixing" the outcome of the game sometimes.