Community Simple Text Modding Tutorial For New Modders

[thegroo]

Thank you very much.

I just learned another thing or two ( or five to six:p)

Regards
Dieter

[clayp]

Thanks MM great stuff I think even an idiot like me can understand it.....

[Mush Martin]

tis only an avatar clay not the real you.
M

[clayp]

Originally Posted by Mush Martin

tis only an avatar clay not the real you.
M

I wish MM it is true and thats the small problem..The game is my life thats why I try to do as much to it as possible to keep me interested and take up time..But I'm not that smart and its why I keep asking for help...Besides being a great guy and an icon of this community Dave(LeoV) was helping me every day by email or PM,now the community has lost one of its biggest assets and I my help... I'm sorry I dont mean to be a whiner....

[Mush Martin]

Well not to worry Clay the community is full of helpful types and
if you need help by all means ask.
M

[ReallyDedPoet]

Originally Posted by Mush Martin

Well not to worry Clay the community is full of helpful types and
if you need help by all means ask.
M

Very true


RDP

[NealT]

MM
If you are not careful, you are going to make me want to really buy this game and if I do that...my wife is going to come after you! :rotfl:

Seriously though, thanks for the detailed explanation. It is making a lot of things come into play for the other SH game I play...

[pythos]

I have yet to have the game upgrade my tower. I am several months into the interval listed in the UPC files for a change of tower, so I think my upgrade of this unit is broken.

Anyone have hints on how to change the tower of my CURRENT sub (not a new career), to what it should have been.

Or any idea how to make the change probabilty of the game 100%, instead of a random chance kinda thing?

I will try some things, but so far none have worked.

When I change things in the save game UPC inti, file, after loading the game, I find that the file has returned back to what I changed it from...very anoying.

[Mush Martin]

Stay tuned Pythos I will see if I cant address some of those issues.
M

[399nkov]

Thanks for your input MM. I'am tuned in. Maybe you can teach a dummy like me a few things. Trial and mostly error is my middle name.

nkov

[AkbarGulag]

Excuse the placement of this, but after consideration, some of this is probably more releveant here than somehwhere else... It poses questions, though the files relevancy is of dubious content. Though it appears useful for making campaign layers.

As i'm sure there are people out there that can answer some of these or maybe all of them, this seemed like the best place to ask. The question is, "What does each line control, in the Campaign.cfg file?"... heres an example.

[Section 6]
1- FileName=data/Campaigns/Campaign/Jap_AirCover.mis
2- StartDate=19380101
3- EndDate=19451231
4- GameModes=SingleMission,SinglePatrol,Career
5- InclusionProbability=100
6- MinimumDifficultyRating=0
7- MinimumPlayerRating=-3
8- EntryFocalPointLong=0
9- EntryFocalPointLat=0
10- MaximumDistanceFromStartPoint=90000
11- ExclusiveLayer=No
12- ExclusiveLayerID=0

Here's what I believe they some of them are... please correct me if incorrect.

1- Is clearly the refference for the resource assosciated with this file and its location.
2- Start date year/day/month for this resource to be in use.
3- End date year/day/month for this resource to cease use.
4- The type of game the user is playing that this will be active in.
5- I can only guess on this one, is it telling me this will deffinately be active 100% of the time, the value being from 0-100%?
6- No idea how this works.
7- No idea how this works. the negative value makes it even less obvious ^^
8-9- I can only guess at this also, help appreciated. But I suspect the value of 0 is a placeholder and this will affect nothing unless a lat and/or longitude is added. What it will actually do if a value is inserted is a myth to me so far. Help needed.
10- Pretty much everything in the campaign.cfg has this maximium distance value of 90000. Is this just the maximum range of the active campaign layer from one focal point... 90,000 being a distance of ?? in a radius around X on the map? or from the actuall location as dictated by the associated resource file?
11- The wording on this one is intriguing... especially interested in what this means.
12- This is clearly in relation to 11... for example, if 11 is 'Yes' instead of 'No' as a value, then layerID=(insert resource here). This line has an associated file or folder?.

I know this may seem like a lot to ask, but as you can see, guessing what everything does only gets you so far

[Mush Martin]

Originally Posted by AkbarGulag

Excuse the placement of this, but after consideration, some of this is probably more releveant here than somehwhere else... It poses questions, though the files relevancy is of dubious content. Though it appears useful for making campaign layers.

As i'm sure there are people out there that can answer some of these or maybe all of them, this seemed like the best place to ask. The question is, "What does each line control, in the Campaign.cfg file?"... heres an example.

[Section 6]
1- FileName=data/Campaigns/Campaign/Jap_AirCover.mis
2- StartDate=19380101
3- EndDate=19451231
4- GameModes=SingleMission,SinglePatrol,Career
5- InclusionProbability=100
6- MinimumDifficultyRating=0
7- MinimumPlayerRating=-3
8- EntryFocalPointLong=0
9- EntryFocalPointLat=0
10- MaximumDistanceFromStartPoint=90000
11- ExclusiveLayer=No
12- ExclusiveLayerID=0

you were doing alright akbar, tater is probably a better guy to ask
but heres my try.

on the first four your good but regarding onset and offset dates.
the unit will have a spawning rating in ME I think. every twenty four
every niety six hours or something.
so within that framework it will spawn every 96 hrs for the duration of
the included dates (based on a 100% inclusion)

it wont respond to player presence and spawn from a base if the player
is below the indicated minimum player level.

probability of inclusion// now to me this was originally
the probability of a single ship spawning within a given formation
but I am not certain but I think in the case of shiv that there is
some relevance to the other game modes (ie single player)
SHIV and SHIII lay the singlemissions out onto the campaign layer
which is why if you make a mission without any sunderlands in it
you will suddenly start getting bombed by a plane you didnt put in.
because its from the campaign layer.

min difficulty means if the min difficulty is set at eight then my suspicion
is that the unit wont spawn unless the game is set for eighty percent
realism/difficulty.

min player level is a requirement that seems to indicate that
if the player has less than the required gameskill level then
the unit will not spawn.


entry focal point lat and long seems to be the anchor point on which
the spawning area is centered. (spawning area size is a variable I think)

Exclusive layer would indicate a single mission not overlayed on a
campaign layer but on a blank ocean so no random units appear
this would be beneficial in an exacting historical recreation mission.
(the above is a sort of I think a campaign layer may also be double
layed in some cases but am uncertain.)

exclusive layer id would to me indicate what layer other than the mis file
to use.


all of the above may not be correct try to further verify
Tater I believe would be the resident expert on this one.

hope it helps
MM

[AkbarGulag]

Everything helps Martin

If we get all these lines deffinitively answered, ill go back and add them all to my original post.

Anyone else know what all these lines do?

In particular, how the -3 'playerRating' is calculated.

Also, MaximumDistanceFromStartPoint=90000.... what does the 90000 mean? is this in metres or other?

Thats an interesting idea for the 'Exclusive Layer' also. Something else for me to ferret out maybe :hmm:

[Mush Martin]

90000 appears to be in Yards/Metres (I think)

[clayp]

MM Sir a question,again... Is it possible to do some of the changes you have put forth not in the context of making a mod but just make them to the game?..I hope my question is clear and understandable....