[WIP] TMO Update: Almost ready

[Bubblehead1980]

My TMO update is finally almost complete, putting the files together, resolving conflicts etc. There are some lingering issues must resolve and am not sure how.

One is to make the nights darker. when actually get a dark night, with current settings, can pull off realistic night surface attacks since I have the visual sensors balanced and toned where are are still a challenge enables player to pull off night surface attacks in a historically accurate fashion. From my research, night surface attacks were typically made 2500-3500 yards on surface at night and often from inside the escort screen, which is important to be able to do in 1944/45 when convoys have plenty of escorts. Problem is the skies need to be darker at night in TMO, often far too light, even without moon. There also seems to be a full moon nearly every night. There was once an excellent mod by Armistead that darkened the skies and worked great. unfortunately I lost it on my old PC, it is not uploaded here, and he does not have it either. So if anyone knows how to remedy this situation, let me know. So how do we darken the nights? Can the moon phases be altered or is this hardcoded?


Second, for some reason on Japanese vessels Allied depth charge racks are showing up. Look at stern on enemy escorts, there are US sailors instead of japanese, no sure what happened?



There are two main issues want to fix prior to release, aside from resolving conflicts with certain mods wish to include.

[s7rikeback]

Originally Posted by Bubblehead1980

My TMO update is finally almost complete, putting the files together, resolving conflicts etc. There are some lingering issues must resolve and am not sure how.

One is to make the nights darker. when actually get a dark night, with current settings, can pull off realistic night surface attacks since I have the visual sensors balanced and toned where are are still a challenge enables player to pull off night surface attacks in a historically accurate fashion. From my research, night surface attacks were typically made 2500-3500 yards on surface at night and often from inside the escort screen, which is important to be able to do in 1944/45 when convoys have plenty of escorts. Problem is the skies need to be darker at night in TMO, often far too light, even without moon. There also seems to be a full moon nearly every night. There was once an excellent mod by Armistead that darkened the skies and worked great. unfortunately I lost it on my old PC, it is not uploaded here, and he does not have it either. So if anyone knows how to remedy this situation, let me know. So how do we darken the nights? Can the moon phases be altered or is this hardcoded?


Second, for some reason on Japanese vessels Allied depth charge racks are showing up. Look at stern on enemy escorts, there are US sailors instead of japanese, no sure what happened?



There are two main issues want to fix prior to release, aside from resolving conflicts with certain mods wish to include.

Bubblehead1980,

To do the sailors... go to each sea units eqp = Just change the CIV / JPN / AM to letters to your choice...

char2_JPNSailors / char2_CIVSailors / char2_AMSailors

char_JPNSailor / char_CIVSailor / char_AMSailor

--------------------------------------

Depth charge racks, again eqp,

Allied = DCRack_SH4_US = file download

JPN = DCRack_SH4 = data > Library > ShipParts > guns_radars.dat has JPN crew.

Hope that helps..

PS: What conflicts are you having ?

[Captain Dave]

I have a mod on my computer for DarkerNightsEnv-V2. It changes the settings in the dat file for EnvColors-Atl. Author listed as: buc-ltrandafir, modified by TW_clear. Timeline in my file says 4/20/2014 but could be from earlier. Not sure if this is what you're looking for, but didn't see this in the downloads.

[Bubblehead1980]

Originally Posted by Captain Dave

I have a mod on my computer for DarkerNightsEnv-V2. It changes the settings in the dat file for EnvColors-Atl. Author listed as: buc-ltrandafir, modified by TW_clear. Timeline in my file says 4/20/2014 but could be from earlier. Not sure if this is what you're looking for, but didn't see this in the downloads.

That may just be it. Work fine with TMO? Care to upload it so I may give it a try.

[Bubblehead1980]

Originally Posted by s7rikeback

Bubblehead1980,

To do the sailors... go to each sea units eqp = Just change the CIV / JPN / AM to letters to your choice...

char2_JPNSailors / char2_CIVSailors / char2_AMSailors

char_JPNSailor / char_CIVSailor / char_AMSailor

--------------------------------------

Depth charge racks, again eqp,

Allied = DCRack_SH4_US = file download

JPN = DCRack_SH4 = data > Library > ShipParts > guns_radars.dat has JPN crew.

Hope that helps..

PS: What conflicts are you having ?

Thanks, will give it a try.

[Captain Dave]

OK Bubblehead, I uploaded the file to the Downloads section. Sh4, Graphics Mods. Hope it works right as I haven't uploaded anything in awhile and am a bit rusty at it.

[Bubblehead1980]

Originally Posted by Captain Dave

OK Bubblehead, I uploaded the file to the Downloads section. Sh4, Graphics Mods. Hope it works right as I haven't uploaded anything in awhile and am a bit rusty at it.

Thanks. Downloaded it. I will let you know how it works once get a chance to load up the sim sometime this week.

[Bubblehead1980]

Originally Posted by Captain Dave

OK Bubblehead, I uploaded the file to the Downloads section. Sh4, Graphics Mods. Hope it works right as I haven't uploaded anything in awhile and am a bit rusty at it.

Thanks for upload. While have not had a chance to test it fully to see how it helps with escorts visuals in various situations, can say it looks great so far, indeed have darker nights which should permit more realistic night surface actions.

One example have so far. January 1943, while en route to patrol area in Celebes Sea, transited Lombok Strait on surface at night. Two DE patrolling the strait did not spot me thanks to dark night at 6000 yards, when they made abrupt course change came somewhat close. Previous experiences in default tmo nights would likely have been spotted. Of course have more testing, esp in later war with large convoys to see how works getting inside screen etc but again should work fine.

[Captain Dave]

Good to hear that the mod could be what you were looking for. I have a large amount of mods on file including a lot of V1.4 stuff. Sometimes a piece of a file from 1.4 is just what I need for 1.5. I'm always tweaking.

[Bubblehead1980]

Originally Posted by Captain Dave

Good to hear that the mod could be what you were looking for. I have a large amount of mods on file including a lot of V1.4 stuff. Sometimes a piece of a file from 1.4 is just what I need for 1.5. I'm always tweaking.

Nice.

So I just gave thee darker nights the first real test in TMO. I changed the TMO visual sensors back to default( had them a little nerfed far as the light factor goes so compensate for the light nights...just changed light factor in .cfg from 3 to 4, now back at 3)

As part of my update, added some traffic, some historical, this includes the 6 ships 13 escort convoy Tang attacked in Koshiki Straits 24/25 June 44. Tang slowly worked its way into the double escort screen, falling in line so on their radar scopes (if picked him up) appeared to be one of the escorts and casually fell out of line, turned and attacked sunk 3 or 4 big ships in a series of attacks from within the screen. Taking full advantage of the subs low visibility at night.

I'll post some screen shots soon but was able to penetrate the screen and attack sunk three ships before had to race away because was finally spotted but evaded safely. This is a game changer finally, about to really allow realistic night surface attacks. Conditions were a typical night, no fog,just dark, scattered clouds, light cover. quarter moon. Could never pull this off without the darker nights mod unless and if do will get shot up when trying to turn away etc.

One facor have to alter to test is I know when created the convoy in the traffic file, I set the escorts skill level ranging from poor to competent, most are set to novice, makes them less aggressive but were decent. Will have to test and see how the competents and vet skill sets do, sure a little more aggressive but with dark nights should be no problem. Again, thanks for sharing .

[Bubblehead1980]

Originally Posted by s7rikeback

Bubblehead1980,

To do the sailors... go to each sea units eqp = Just change the CIV / JPN / AM to letters to your choice...

char2_JPNSailors / char2_CIVSailors / char2_AMSailors

char_JPNSailor / char_CIVSailor / char_AMSailor

--------------------------------------

Depth charge racks, again eqp,

Allied = DCRack_SH4_US = file download

JPN = DCRack_SH4 = data > Library > ShipParts > guns_radars.dat has JPN crew.

Hope that helps..

PS: What conflicts are you having ?

Hi, strikeback,

Think provided is dead. I am finally getting around to trying to resolve this issue. Little confused..

[s7rikeback]

Originally Posted by Bubblehead1980

Hi, strikeback,

Think provided is dead. I am finally getting around to trying to resolve this issue. Little confused..

Try this...

[Bubblehead1980]

Originally Posted by s7rikeback

Try this...

Thanks! I am looking at this currently, little confused. I have the guns_radars.dat open (stock) and I see the DC_Rack_SH4...this has the IJN crew yes? This particular node needs to be implemented into TMO? I don't see the same node in the TMO DC_Rack_SH4. I am assuming this means the stock is still showing American crew for IJN DC racks? I wonder if this has happened to anyone else or if I have a corrupted install. I never recall having this issue with TMO prior.

[s7rikeback]

Originally Posted by Bubblehead1980

Thanks! I am looking at this currently, little confused. I have the guns_radars.dat open (stock) and I see the DC_Rack_SH4...this has the IJN crew yes? This particular node needs to be implemented into TMO? I don't see the same node in the TMO DC_Rack_SH4. I am assuming this means the stock is still showing American crew for IJN DC racks? I wonder if this has happened to anyone else or if I have a corrupted install. I never recall having this issue with TMO prior.

So in the stock guns_radars.dat, the DC_Rack_SH4 has the following Entries:



The WM1 node is used to call animated crewman to the weapon, in this case the DC_Rack_SH4 in stock is set up to call JP_SOL_MRN_01, so you will get a Japanese crewman to man this weapon.

Example for the JP units:
NodeName=W01
LinkName=DCRack_SH4
StartDate=19380101
EndDate=19451231

---------------------------------

The file I'm sharing with you, is set up to call an AM_SOL_MRN_01, so you will get an American crewman to man this weapon.

Example for the AM units:
NodeName=W01
LinkName=DCRack_SH4_US
StartDate=19380101
EndDate=19451231



So you can now set your ships up correctly with correct rostered sailors manning the DC Rack crews.

Hope this helps, just remember to edit the eqp W0 calls to call the correct files..

[Macgregor the Hammer]

I'm really looking forward to your upgrade BH! Not having a realistic way of hunting and attacking at night is something many of us has longed for.

It's nice to see you bring life back to TMO!