Patch question related to ESTAB

[navwarcol]

I have a quick question regarding patches. When I purchased the game, one of the first things I did, was , just to experiment.. created a MAUS panzer unit for the German side.. did not really put it into any scenario, just made a platoon of 2 of them in the estab file, and left it for future tinkering. I have just noticed that apparently when I put through the last patch, which was just a few days after I did this, it seems to have erased that unit from both the vehicle portion, as well as from the force section, the 2 vehicle platoon I had made. Is there any easy way to prevent this happening again if I download another patch?
Thanks in advance!

[Arjuna]

Yes save the estab file under a different name and then it won't be overwritten. But the update will not search your existing file and merge it with the new one. There is just too many variables at play to make this an effctive option right now. If you are careful, you can open the xml file in a text editor and copy the equipment and units you added and then paste these into the new updated estabs. But you will have to ensure that the IDs for these are unique. If they clash with anything else you will need to manually change them. Then you can load and compile the edited xml file into the Estab Editor and compile it.

Ideally in the long run we would like to sup[port multiple estab files. That way we could have users creating their own estab file for things like this and just link it to the scenario. This would require a fair bit of work to have the linked estab files verified for unique IDs and to handle clashes where the ID is the same or the equipment of unit names are the same. In some cases you want to override and others not. So it gets very messy.

[navwarcol]

Ah, ok. Thanks Dave.
It is not really a problem if I know I need to do that, just was wondering if it was somehow an option I had missed in my excitement over already having a patch haha.

[Arjuna]

I would recommend if you are going to mod or add estabs then it's best to start with the standard one, save it under a different name and then make a copy of the scenarios you want to use with it and link these to the new modified estab file. That way you will end up with the original scenarios and estab files plus additional scenarios that use the modified estab file. When it comes time to update with a patch, the standard files will be automatically updated. You will, however, have to update your modified estab file ( as explained above ) and then link this to copies of your desired scenarios.

[navwarcol]

I have a follow up question Dave...
With the upcoming patch, you made some changes to formation codes. I see formations as one part of the estab files. If I do as listed above, and make my own estab file with a different name, will the formation fix in the patch apply to only the main estab file? or is the formation code that you worked on, something higher in the "chain of command" than estab files are, thus enabling it to fix formations in all estab files below it?
Thanks again!
R

[Arjuna]

ORIGINAL: navwarcol

I have a follow up question Dave...
With the upcoming patch, you made some changes to formation codes. I see formations as one part of the estab files. If I do as listed above, and make my own estab file with a different name, will the formation fix in the patch apply to only the main estab file? or is the formation code that you worked on, something higher in the "chain of command" than estab files are, thus enabling it to fix formations in all estab files below it?
Thanks again!
R

The changes I have made to the formation code are embedded withing the Cmd Ops exe file. They are affected by the formation data contained within the estab file. eg when it comes time to work out how many metres per man the frontage should be it looks up the data from the estab file for the formation type in question. So if you have changed the formation data but not the formation type name then yes this will affect the new code but it should survive fine. It may mean that a line formation using the new converted estabs will be wider and deeper than the ones generated from your estab file.

Does that answer your question?

[navwarcol]

Well, I did not actually change any parts of the formations, just tinkered a bit with a British tank, and with the aforementioned Maus German one.. then followed your instructions above to save it under a new name. I suppose what I am wondering is if the newly named ESTAB file will benefit from the work you did on the formation codes. I think your reply, that what you actually worked on, is in the .exe file, does answer that in the affirmative, that my new estab will still benefit from the changes.

[Arjuna]

Yes that's right.