American Civil War Game Club (ACWGC)

Gents, I've been playing around with the weather settings in the .pdt file (JT-Overland) and was wondering, what does the Flag setting do (last setting before the weather description) ? I was hoping it would change to the alternate terrain graphics during the turn from normal to alternate to give the map the full weather effect, but no luck. After testing it with the setting from 0 to 1 or 0 to -1, nothing happened.

Does anyone know if it is possible to change the terrain view to alternate terrain, with the weather changes, during a scenario? I'm working on a large scale complete CW scenario and would like to add the weather and terrain effects. Thanks to Ken Miller's detailed scenario editing guide I've been able to edit all parts of the scenario so far (Kudos to Ken!!!). Great news is that I haven't found any restrictions in the JT-overland version. It looks to be wide open at this point....map editing, OOB, scenario, .pdt file and graphics.

Lieutenant Colonel Derek Hampel
Fifth Infantry Brigade
Second Div., XV Corps
Army of the Tennessee

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Union War Dog!
MG. Derek Hampel
Cmdr. Second Div., XV Corps
Army of the Tennessee

Hmmm. Stumped me; John coded the weather so you'll have to wait for his reply.

I'm looking forward to your scenario.

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BG Ken 'Muddy' Jones
1st Brigade/3rd Division/XV Corps/Army of Tennessee
USA

There is no indication that the weather section of the pdt has anything at all to do with displaying alternate terrain.
In addition to Ken Miller's info, you can see what the pdt data controls in the "demo Overland" pdt that I included with the game. It is for info only. Don't try to incorporate it in a scenario.

John Ferry
Overland Co-designer

Glad people are using the Engineering pages. Apparently you missed the comment about the Flags Value.

0 Flags Name No flags defined, value should be 0.

The last I heard the Weather Flag has no affect, I'm guessing it was put in just in case additional changes came up but no code has been put in to use them.

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Gen. Ken Miller



The McKeesport Union Guard

3/1/II
Chief of Staff
AotP

Fwiw - in the CWB series Scenario editor if you go in to the menu and go

Scenario (right next to File on the top most menu), then -> Terrain Graphics -> Alternate -this sets the map graphcs as what you would have in the Map/Alt folder of your CWB titles.

The stock graphics that are in there are the winter/autumn ones.

-That being said I am not sure that the graphics are controlled by the PDT, particularly if Ken's site doesn't show that. I will have to check to see how the M&P engine shows it (because it probably is the same way in CWB). I guess it is possible that it is handled on a scenario by scenario basis and not in the PDT at all.

I am saying this because the other features under the Scenario entry on the menu would be the things you would type in to describe your scenario and set the specific conditions (like time of battle, number of turns, who goes first.... things like that) which all write to the scn file itself.

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~Retired~

Thanks guys for the quick feedback. I guess I was more hoping the setting would allow the change from standard to alternate terrain or back and forth based on the weather line in the .pdt file. Like Ken mentioned, it was probably set during the programming and was not used and left with the default as "0".

As my large scale map covers the entire eastern US I was hoping to have the seasonal changes be seen with some graphic changes with the weather updates. I was hoping to have the higher elevations transition to a bit of snow and have the lower elevations change from the green to fall/winter brownish style. As there was already the full foliage and fall tree graphics I was going to use those to switch back and forth as well. I guess at this point it won't be an option.

To get an idea of the scenario I'm designing. It's a Division scaled scenario covering the complete civil war (using all the OOB's from BGS, HPS and JT combined). It has been an ongoing project for some years now; which is final getting close to completion. Here is a view of the map at some earlier stage...


Thanks again for letting me know.

Lieutenant Colonel Derek Hampel
Fifth Infantry Brigade
Second Div., XV Corps
Army of the Tennessee

_________________
Union War Dog!
MG. Derek Hampel
Cmdr. Second Div., XV Corps
Army of the Tennessee

Guys, just for quick clarification, I already knew that the terrain graphics are set in the scenario design heading for that scenario. I was just hoping that the weather lines in the .pdt would allow for it to change based on the weather condition which comes from the .pdt file. As the scenario editor only allows the original terrain graphics to be selected one time during the scenario creation, I was hoping that the weather lines would allow the terrain to change as the weather conditions changed.

Here are some lines of the weather conditions in the Overland1.pdt file:
1 1864 5 4 4 0 100 70 100 100 0 0 Nice spring morning, temps mid-50s
1 1864 5 4 14 0 100 70 100 100 0 0 Sunshine, temps high 60s
1 1864 5 4 20 0 100 70 100 100 0 0 Clear night, temps mid 50s
1 1864 5 9 14 0 100 70 100 100 0 0 Temp mid-80s.
1 1864 5 9 20 0 100 10 125 90 0 0 Thunderstorms, temp mid 70s

You can see that the weather is changing by the time/turn from the .pdt file. The original terrain is only set once in the scenario editor under the heading section Scenario->Terrain Graphics-> (1) Normal or (2) Alternate. This is why I was hoping that the option existed to have it change with the weather conditions and thought that maybe the Flag setting might be the setting/switch which would change the terrain back and forth.

Hope that explains it better.

Lieutenant Colonel Derek Hampel
Fifth Infantry Brigade
Second Div., XV Corps
Army of the Tennessee

_________________
Union War Dog!
MG. Derek Hampel
Cmdr. Second Div., XV Corps
Army of the Tennessee

Also, FYI, weather in Overland is based in the book on Civil War weather in Virginia, listed in Overland's bibliography. Although I'm not aware of books on weather in other locales, there are enough original source weather reports in diaries and such, that the actual weather could be incorporated in the pdts of all the games.
John Ferry
Overland co-designer

I can't say for certain since I haven't been able to find my notes on the Weather line's format but I am pretty certain it can't change how the map looks. HPS games use the Map folder to contain all the terrain features graphics. The basic map look is set in four files 2DGround50.bmp, 2DGround100.bmp, 3DGround50.bmp and 3DGround100.bmp. If you wanted to change from summer to winter layout these are the files you change. Since the game always uses these files and expects them in the Maps folder there is no way to point the game elsewhere. The path isn't in any of the game files so it is probably hard programmed.

What you can do is change the bmp files manually to reflect seasons but I suspect you will have a problem with this since you are using a map that is so large it covers both cold and warm climates.

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General Kennon Whitehead
Chatham Grays
AoT II/1/3 (CSA)

Hi Kennon, you are right. The graphics from the map come from the files you mentioned (2DGround50.bmp, 2DGround100.bmp, 3DGround50.bmp and 3DGround100.bmp) in the Map folder but the same files also exist in the Map->Alt folder. This was my intention, to have the files change from standard Map folder to Alternate Map folder so the graphic used would update with that turn from the weather line in the .pdt file. As the weather update is based on the time (turn) of the scenario, the conditions are applied based on that line and remain in effect until the next weather line goes into effect. My hope was that the Flag setting would allow the change from the standard Map folder to the Map->Alt folder which contains the terrain graphics files. With such a setting the terrain map graphics would update with the change of the weather/turn/time line in the .pdt file and could switch from standard (green) to alternate (fall, winter or muddy) graphics. This way the map would use the appropriate terrain graphics based on the weather line Flag from the .pdt file. That was the bases for the question.

Lieutenant Colonel Derek Hampel
Fifth Infantry Brigade
Second Div., XV Corps
Army of the Tennessee) terrain graphics.

_________________
Union War Dog!
MG. Derek Hampel
Cmdr. Second Div., XV Corps
Army of the Tennessee

That is a possibility. I looked in the Overland Alt folder and some of the icons did look like fall. If I ever come across the command line format for weather someone gave me I might be able to figure it out. Otherwise trial and error to find what does it. I suspect though because of the way they read files it has to be done scenario wide not by the weather line. Normal games don't cover a large enough time period for weather to change the terrain.

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General Kennon Whitehead
Chatham Grays
AoT II/1/3 (CSA)

not sure if this helps but the hps 1776 game has snow terrain in the alt graphics folder which load automaticly depending on the scenario. i think also the hps nrc game is the same way though i don't own that one.

regards

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I'm betting the graphics used in each scenario is still specified when each individual scenario is built. Not a Rev War guy, but pretty sure it would be basically the same as ACW.
John Ferry
LTC 2/20th Corps