Scenario 30 Main Campaign with CVs Added Mod Design Notes



This mod is really only intended to be a testbed for aircraft carriers and carrier based aircraft in the new War in Spain engine and as such is totally ahistorical. Neither Nationalist Spain nor Republican Spain possessed any aircraft carriers during the civil war.


My curiosity about this new WitPAE inspired engine compelled me to add a carrier for each side in the Main Campaign scenario of War in Spain.


The easiest way to create this mod was to take an existing historical carrier class present in the database (Argus) and copy that entry twice so creating a Republican Argus class and a Nationalist Argus class. I didn't want to give the sides something that was completely beyond the bounds of possibility and anachronistic such as an Essex class carrier.


Given Spain's economic malaise prior to and during the 1930's the Spanish Navy having any carrier(s) in service was highly improbable. With this in mind I settled on the British Argus class as a template for two reasons. Firstly the Argus existed at the time of the Spanish Civil War and secondly it seemed right to me that if prevailing economic conditions had improved exponentially then the Argus is precisely the form factor of aircraft carrier the Spanish government might have tendered a contract for.


I added an Argus class carrier for each side. I tried to name them with vaguely faction appropriate names which I apologize to Spanish speakers for. I am sure there are grammatical errors and other mistakes but I didn't give much thought to the ship names or the air group squadron designations. Feel free to rename them in the editor. You have my permission to modify this in any way you like. I'm good with it.


I then needed to add carrier capable aircraft to the newly commissioned ships. This posed a problem as unsurprisingly I couldn't find any such aircraft in the game database. My intention was to give both carriers a squadron of Swordfish torpedo bombers but unfortunately they are not in the game database. The Swordfish seemed a good fit as it historically was in production at the start of the SCW.


I decided to make two models of aircraft which are in the game carrier capable. I choose the Martinside F.4 and the CASA-V.Vildebeest. I chose these types because they resemble the Swordfish and are the sort of aircraft the Spanish Navy punching well above its weight might use as carrier aircraft. The F.4 is a fighter type produced at the end of WW I and is no match for anything even close to a contemporary fighter aircraft in 1936 but it does have a small bombing capacity which appealed to me as being the kind of 'more bang for your buck' specification requirement a 1930's peacetime non-totalitarian government might demand in a project that would consume a large portion of the defense budget for a secondary European power.


I have added 10 to the pool of the Naval Vildebeest for both sides and 8 to the pool of the Naval F.4 for both sides. As the carriers have an airgroup capacity of 18 each side has the equivalent of a reserve airgroup with which to replenish losses. In War in Spain every single aircraft feels precious and these carrier capable types will seem even more so. Look after them. I decided to favor the torpedo bomber squadrons in terms of numbers as naval attack will be the primary mission for these carriers. You are free to use them as you wish but expending very rare airframes on ground attack missions might not be the best application of your assets. You can change the number of aircraft in each squadron in the editor if you want to. I did consider a 50/50 split with 9 in each but decided to increase the number of torpedo bombers.


Finally I want to reiterate that this mod is wholly and completely fictional, ahistorical and any other synonyms of those words you care to think of.


I hope you enjoy playing around with carriers during the Spanish Civil War.




Technical Notes

The editor can be finnicky to use and crashed on me a couple times when saving my work. Be careful when inputting text in the search box or editing names as the application can occasionally softlock. If you plan on using the editor I recommend you save often and I do mean often.


The Argus class carriers used by both sides in the mod use AnShil0081.bmp as a ship image.

In the editor Argus uses AnShil0077.bmp which does not look like the real Argus whatsoever. AnShil0081.bmp is actually CVE Avenger BD which is editor database entry 264 in Ship Classes. This was the in game image which most closely resembles the real world Argus.


When playing the mod and creating an Air Combat TF the Air Combat Mission picture will not show up in the TF detail screen. To remedy this go to the Art folder in your War in Spain installation folder and locate the file J_MissionT.bmp - you will need to rename this to J_Mission.bmp and rename the current J_Mission.bmp to J_MissionDEFAULT.bmp or something similar so you know which is the original file used by the game.



Editor Entries Created

Argus Nat - 220 in Ship Classes

Argus Rep - 222 in Ship Classes

Viva Libertad - 3 in Ships

Reina Isabella - 5 in Ships

Naval F.4 Nat - 332 in Aircraft

Naval Vildebeest Nat - 333 in Aircraft

Naval F.4 Rep - 335 in Aircraft

Naval Vildebeest Rep - 336 in Aircraft

1st Carrier TB Sq - 22 in Airgroups

1st Carrier FT Sq - 23 in Airgroups

I Carrier TB Sq - 25 in Airgroups

I Carrier FT Sq - 26 in Airgroups

