Terrain shp question

[omegaall]

In a map I am working on I want to use some shore btry guns as multi hex mil buildings. I do not need then as actual items but as "dressing" as they are not part of the needed defences. I wanted to use the Jap 5" costal gun icon for this.
How do I find the actual icon to get it to make it into a multihex building shp? Converting it I suspect will be a small problem but that is the next step.

Thanks
Nick

[RockinHarry]

ORIGINAL: omegaall

In a map I am working on I want to use some shore btry guns as multi hex mil buildings. I do not need then as actual items but as "dressing" as they are not part of the needed defences. I wanted to use the Jap 5" costal gun icon for this.
How do I find the actual icon to get it to make it into a multihex building shp? Converting it I suspect will be a small problem but that is the next step.

Thanks
Nick

first of all, open the rockinharry terrain shape files PDF document to be found in one of the steel panthers game folders. Look through the document and find the invisible stone building shape file number. I´m not at home at the moment, so I can´t tell it by looking through the doc myself, sorry![X(] (could be it´s one of the single stone building user 1 files) If found place the invisible stone buildings where you like.

Now to the dressing: Purchase some of those units that have the desired shore battery icon and place them in the invisible stone building hexes. Save your map/scenario and start is a normal game. In your game turn 1 abandon the shore battery units with the "9" key and move the spawned crew one hex off or so. Save the game. Go to save game folder and rename the file to a scenario file (from save*.dat something to scen*.dat) Reopen the renamed save file in the editor and keep editing your scenario until you´re finished.

Let us know if you get it working please![:)]

[omegaall]

Thanks "Rockin"Harry for that.

I did try what you mentioned, yes it works, and it sort of solves the problem.

Since I have to buy the shore batterys it ended up simpler to just buy them. Then remove the men, set it to zero and set the cost to zero.

What I really want to do is not actually buy these units as that do not play any part of the scenario besides window dressing. That is why I wanted a simple "make the terrain look like one" approach. This also means I dont have to purchase any and they will not be part of the unit/formation count.

This is a bit like the areoplanes, etc that are part of the 'a' set of terrain shape files.

Nick

[RockinHarry]

ORIGINAL: omegaall

Thanks "Rockin"Harry for that.

I did try what you mentioned, yes it works, and it sort of solves the problem.

Since I have to buy the shore batterys it ended up simpler to just buy them. Then remove the men, set it to zero and set the cost to zero.

What I really want to do is not actually buy these units as that do not play any part of the scenario besides window dressing. That is why I wanted a simple "make the terrain look like one" approach. This also means I dont have to purchase any and they will not be part of the unit/formation count.

This is a bit like the areoplanes, etc that are part of the 'a' set of terrain shape files.

Nick

Ah ok. If unit count is of concern, then making dedicated terrain icons might be the better solution. However, it´s some more work as you need to manually convert unit icons to terrain icons and you need to learn about the Shape file editor as well as some paint program. Is that what you want?

I checked my docs and found that the jap 5" bunker icon 691 is located in Icon0017.shp file, slot 69. If you want to convert it to a multihex building shape, I would suggest to use Ter84 or Ter85 (Use1, Use2) shape files which have many unused slots left! Basically you load Icon0017 into Freds Shape editor, export icon 70 (due to +1 offset!) as BMP file, edit it to look like a (7 hex) multi hex building/fortress in a paint program, save as BMP, reimport to Freds Shape Editor with Ter84 or 85 loaded and convert to an unused slot of your choice. As said, these are the basic steps only! You need to convert for all 4 zoom (z1 to z4) levels alike.

If you want to add your new multi hex icon to "Military Buildings - 6" then you can try to expand Ter61 which holds this sort of stuff.

Need more detailed instructions? Let me know and I´ll write something up. If you´re a trained icon maker expect to spent about <=2 hours making a new terrain icon usable in the game. Otherwise it´s about half a day or more, dependent upon your learning skills.

[omegaall]

ORIGINAL: RockinHarry

ORIGINAL: omegaall

Thanks "Rockin"Harry for that.

I did try what you mentioned, yes it works, and it sort of solves the problem.

Since I have to buy the shore batterys it ended up simpler to just buy them. Then remove the men, set it to zero and set the cost to zero.

What I really want to do is not actually buy these units as that do not play any part of the scenario besides window dressing. That is why I wanted a simple "make the terrain look like one" approach. This also means I dont have to purchase any and they will not be part of the unit/formation count.

This is a bit like the areoplanes, etc that are part of the 'a' set of terrain shape files.

Nick

Ah ok. If unit count is of concern, then making dedicated terrain icons might be the better solution. However, it´s some more work as you need to manually convert unit icons to terrain icons and you need to learn about the Shape file editor as well as some paint program. Is that what you want?

I checked my docs and found that the jap 5" bunker icon 691 is located in Icon0017.shp file, slot 69. If you want to convert it to a multihex building shape, I would suggest to use Ter84 or Ter85 (Use1, Use2) shape files which have many unused slots left! Basically you load Icon0017 into Freds Shape editor, export icon 70 (due to +1 offset!) as BMP file, edit it to look like a (7 hex) multi hex building/fortress in a paint program, save as BMP, reimport to Freds Shape Editor with Ter84 or 85 loaded and convert to an unused slot of your choice. As said, these are the basic steps only! You need to convert for all 4 zoom (z1 to z4) levels alike.

If you want to add your new multi hex icon to "Military Buildings - 6" then you can try to expand Ter61 which holds this sort of stuff.

Need more detailed instructions? Let me know and I´ll write something up. If you´re a trained icon maker expect to spent about <=2 hours making a new terrain icon usable in the game. Otherwise it´s about half a day or more, dependent upon your learning skills.

Thaks for all this. I have fixed up the icons and it did not take that long. The big problem comming from this is the "snow drift" effect I seem to have aquired.

This is obvious on the smaller icons, Z2 and espically Z1 sets.
Unfortunately I am stuck with PaintShop pro and MicroSquish Paintbrush on my PC.

Also how critical is it with size of icons. I used Single hex stone building User 2 as I only wanted these over 2 hexes at most. The overlap hex was made into a stone building with the invisible stone building hex of yours.

Nick

[RockinHarry]

ORIGINAL: omegaall

ORIGINAL: RockinHarry

ORIGINAL: omegaall

Thanks "Rockin"Harry for that.

I did try what you mentioned, yes it works, and it sort of solves the problem.

Since I have to buy the shore batterys it ended up simpler to just buy them. Then remove the men, set it to zero and set the cost to zero.

What I really want to do is not actually buy these units as that do not play any part of the scenario besides window dressing. That is why I wanted a simple "make the terrain look like one" approach. This also means I dont have to purchase any and they will not be part of the unit/formation count.

This is a bit like the areoplanes, etc that are part of the 'a' set of terrain shape files.

Nick

Ah ok. If unit count is of concern, then making dedicated terrain icons might be the better solution. However, it´s some more work as you need to manually convert unit icons to terrain icons and you need to learn about the Shape file editor as well as some paint program. Is that what you want?

I checked my docs and found that the jap 5" bunker icon 691 is located in Icon0017.shp file, slot 69. If you want to convert it to a multihex building shape, I would suggest to use Ter84 or Ter85 (Use1, Use2) shape files which have many unused slots left! Basically you load Icon0017 into Freds Shape editor, export icon 70 (due to +1 offset!) as BMP file, edit it to look like a (7 hex) multi hex building/fortress in a paint program, save as BMP, reimport to Freds Shape Editor with Ter84 or 85 loaded and convert to an unused slot of your choice. As said, these are the basic steps only! You need to convert for all 4 zoom (z1 to z4) levels alike.

If you want to add your new multi hex icon to "Military Buildings - 6" then you can try to expand Ter61 which holds this sort of stuff.

Need more detailed instructions? Let me know and I´ll write something up. If you´re a trained icon maker expect to spent about <=2 hours making a new terrain icon usable in the game. Otherwise it´s about half a day or more, dependent upon your learning skills.

Thaks for all this. I have fixed up the icons and it did not take that long. The big problem comming from this is the "snow drift" effect I seem to have aquired.

This is obvious on the smaller icons, Z2 and espically Z1 sets.
Unfortunately I am stuck with PaintShop pro and MicroSquish Paintbrush on my PC.

Also how critical is it with size of icons. I used Single hex stone building User 2 as I only wanted these over 2 hexes at most. The overlap hex was made into a stone building with the invisible stone building hex of yours.

Nick

The snow drift effect can be avoided if you make a "pixel resize" in Paintshop Pro from the z4 icons! That´s how I do normally. Scale resize figures are included in my DOC file.

Some overlapping into neighboring hexes should be ok with single hex icons and if the invisible stone building works ok for you, then you appear to have the perfect solution!Show some screenshot of your work if you´re done please![:)]..or if it´s yet secret, looking forward to your finished scenario![8D]

[omegaall]

ORIGINAL: RockinHarry

The snow drift effect can be avoided if you make a "pixel resize" in Paintshop Pro from the z4 icons! That´s how I do normally. Scale resize figures are included in my DOC file.

Some overlapping into neighboring hexes should be ok with single hex icons and if the invisible stone building works ok for you, then you appear to have the perfect solution!Show some screenshot of your work if you´re done please![:)]..or if it´s yet secret, looking forward to your finished scenario![8D]

A qyestion on these scale sizes in your DOC. Whne I look at the Mil Buildings there is a lot of spare "invisible" area per SHP inage and the actual building is smaller again. Also SHP image is smaller that the sizes in your DOC. Which way should I be going with this?
I finally finished the forts and got rid of the snow drift effect. I am not sure if they really are that great as a single building. Hence the need to consider a multi hex approach.
Harry if you want and I would appreciate your feed back I can send the 4 .SHP file to you as I can not see whare I can post any pics on this site.

Thanks for the help so far. It has nicely stopped me doing 'real' $ work.

[RockinHarry]

Hm..sounds like you opened an older version of the Military buildings, since the most recent version (fixed by Tracer/JimNSB) has the sizes corrected, as well as correct centering. The original release version in fact was unfinished! I think you can download the most recent version of Military buildings (Ter61) over at the Depot somewhere. It´s also part of the latest V8.3 SPWAW full download.

The scale figures (all of z4=100%) is z3 = 80%, z2 = 60% and z1=35%. A simple pixel resize in PSP gives you the appropiate zoom levels without the "snow drift" as said. Could be Tracer used somewhat different scale figures when he made the corrected zoom levels for Ter61, but I can´t tell for sure. I remember he mentioned something like that in the past.

The spare invisible areas is a known problem (or limitation) of the 7 hex multi hex icons. You either have all seven hexes filled or only parts of it. In the map editor you can delete the "stone building attribute" unwanted empty hexes with "Mixed" terrain UNLESS it´s the center hex which must not be deleted since this deletes the entire icon! In Freds Map editor you can even customize hex attributes to what you really want in your scenario. I imagine modelling your shore battery would be using just your new icon, placed on invisble "rough" and/or invisible "Entrenchment" terrain and then place appropiate gun units in any of the hexes. The "stone building" terrain does not really portrays a gun battery position properly, so the above mentioned method might give you a far better result. But if it´s just terrain dressing as you say and not functional for your scenario, then just placing them as stone buildings might be just sufficient for the purpose. (buildings start to burn sooner or later when hit by HE and the resulting fires and smoke cause possible unwanted LOS obstruction. Also buildings block LOS just by some of their inherent attributes and that might be an unwanted effect as well. That can be fixed in Freds Map editor, so it´s possible to have a completely "flat" stone building hex without any LOS obstruction)

The single hex icons might work better at times, the more if you need a sort of multi hex building with the center hex beeing not a stone building!

Just send your files over to harizan@web.de and I´ll check them out! Please make sure these are zipped up (~600kb) before sending!

Attached below is some small test scenario/map that shows 3 possible styles of gun positions.

#1 is normal stone buildings (using row house icons)
#2 is normal stone buildings, but height atrribute is removed. (thus making them level terrain buildings).
#3 just uses the stone building icons, but terrain attribute is invisible rough and entrenchment.

There´s many more variations thinkable, but most of them can only be done with freds Map Editor.

Scenario file is zipped, but renamed to fit the forum attachment requirements. After downloading just rename to *.zip again and unpack. The scne file goes into scenario slot 1 if unpacked into the Scen folder.

[omegaall]

Thanks. For what I am trying to do its a simple terrain matter and blocked LOS will not an issue.
If they get blown up its not a big concern as they should not be part of any points count. Same applies to the manning of the positions, no men.
Since doing the icons I sent, I have been considering removing all the cover dirt from the icons and leaving that "invisible". That should then pick up the underlying terrain and be more appropiate.

You made reference to invisible 'rough' and 'Entrenchment'. This rings a bell but I can not remember where/how it goes.

I only get small bursts at this as the "Minister of War" starts to read the riot act about domestic things not fun [:(]

Omegaall

[RockinHarry]

ORIGINAL: omegaall

Thanks. For what I am trying to do its a simple terrain matter and blocked LOS will not an issue.
If they get blown up its not a big concern as they should not be part of any points count. Same applies to the manning of the positions, no men.
Since doing the icons I sent, I have been considering removing all the cover dirt from the icons and leaving that "invisible". That should then pick up the underlying terrain and be more appropiate.

You made reference to invisible 'rough' and 'Entrenchment'. This rings a bell but I can not remember where/how it goes.

I only get small bursts at this as the "Minister of War" starts to read the riot act about domestic things not fun [:(]

Omegaall

Did you email me anything lately?[&:] If yes, make sure topic has "SPWAW" in it, otherwise it might slip through the spam filters.

If you check the map attached above in Freds Map Editor, open the inspection window and copy/paste from the bottom 3 house hexes which contain the invisble rough and entrenchment! My map editing document (the signature thingy) contains all details you need to know.[:)]

[omegaall]

Just resent it this time with SPWAW in title.
Also went through your doc on SHPedit and Resolved the problems of the invisible bits.[:D] Funny how reading thins helps to make simple problems vanish.

Thanks

[RockinHarry]

ORIGINAL: omegaall

Just resent it this time with SPWAW in title.
Also went through your doc on SHPedit and Resolved the problems of the invisible bits.[:D] Funny how reading thins helps to make simple problems vanish.

Thanks

yep [:D]

[omegaall]

I have been working on some multi hex buildings. I keephaving problems getting the building to center properly. I have read Fred's help file in SHP Edit on setting teh center but this still does not work. The icon always seems to be off set one way or the other.

What is the secret in getting the icon to center properly?
For SPWAW is it necessary to use the SPFix in Fred's SHP Edit or is there something I have missed in the various shp files or the actual way its done?

Thanks

[omegaall]

A further question re Fred's SHP Edit.
In the SP Fix how is the icon size determined, rectangle or square re its size for the center?

This is an issue as it is not possible to see the whole icon in the little window.

The icons i am using espically for the z4 group are large and its not easy to see it sufficently.

Thanks

[RockinHarry]

I´ll try to write something up next couple of days.[:)] Generally in PSP adding a green/brown pixel in the upper left hand corner (0,0) of the icon helps centering in the shape editor. That´s how I do. Freds editor appears to look for the first non transparent pixel and then counts from this point on. Also typing figures, instead of using the crosshairs helps as well. Freds shape editor is not free of problems (bugs!), but with some tricks you can work around most of the time.