Unit Editor

[mgarnett]

Hi Guys,

I'm happy to say that the unit editor is complete, apart from rezaf's request here tm.asp?m=2871561&mpage=2, which I will implement shortly.

All I need now is an explanation of what the "Add Traits" and "Remove Traits" values represent. What I am trying to determine is, is there a list of "approved" traits. If so, I will just need to implement a small menu alowing a user to add a trait into the "Add" or "Remove" columns of the editor. If not, are they only for "information" purposes and as such, don't require editing, merely listing, if so, I don't need to do anything further.

Features of the editor include:

- Browse the equipment database
- Edit values for units already in the database using simple "spin" edit controls
- Add new units into the database
- Delete units from the database
- Get a list of other units in the database with similar attributes as the currently selected unit using one of twelve criteria (this is easily expanded upon if needed)
- Save the new equipment database as a diferent file ready for play so you don't have to overwrite your original
- Save the results of your queries to text files
- View units in the database filtering by any unit type and/or nationality

As soon as I have the information about unit traits I will release a test version. I have provided a screenshot of what will most likely be the final GUI below.

Cheers

Mark

[Dumnorix]

Very nice !

Thank you so mutch !

H.Balck

[HerzKaraya]

This looks great - looking forward to tinker with it!

[Rood]

Thank you again for your work [&o].

I think that some of the traits have an impact on gameplay.
For example close 'meng' could mean it would ignore entrenchments, I don't see that anywhere else in the file.
'no purchase' and 'bonus' will obviously mean that the unit should never show up in the buy units screen.
'alpine' could be the movement through hills/mountains but that is also covered by Type of Movement 8.
What 'rott' and 'fixedt' actually do I have no clue (probably refers to rotating turret and fixed turret)

In most cases it's gonna be based on trial and error to see if they have an impact and what they actually do.

I'll hope to get some of those cleared up by the weekend, depending on the weather [8D].

[Dumnorix]

Traits are separated with spaces. So each trait is separate. There is no trait like "alpine close bonus" - these are 3 separate traits.

Traits which are actually working in 1.0 are:
- meng - military engineer, ignores entrenchment
- beng - bridge engineer
- para - paratrooper
- fortkiller - bonus against structures
- radar - initiative bonus to all planes within spotting range
- green - always starts with zero exp, even if scenario settings tell otherwise
- nopurchase - is not listed in purchase menu
- noupgrade - cannot be upgraded
- noreplace - cannot be replaced
- bonus - These are units which are randomly given at the beginning of a scenario in a campaign. Cannot be purchased. Bonus unit can be upgraded only to another bonus unit

"alpine" trait was supposed to give mountain units some advantage in mountains terrain, but it is not used. Their movement advantage is expressed with a special alpine movement type. "fixt" and "rott" stand for fixed turret/rotating turret respectively, and in the future initiative penalty (-3) will occur when a fixt unit attacks rott unit, but for now it is hard-coded for AT and tank classes. "lsup" stands for long-term suppression and is not used yet either.

Some entries have a unit ID that starts with the "#" symbol such as - you can not buy this ones in the scenario !

H.Balck

[mgarnett]

Thanks Guys, that's very helpful.

What I'll do initially is have the two list boxes at the bottom centre of the GUI that display those traits that already exist for a particular unit. Then, if a user right clicks on one of those list boxes, a small context menu will pop up giving you the option to add a trait to either box. I'll limit the selection at the moment to those listed by Dumnorix as they appear to be the only ones supported by version 1.0.

What I will most likely do is put the traits in a text file (along with a short description of each) so that as more are added to the game, you need only add them to the text file and the editor will pick them up from there. It will save me having to recompile a new version each time a trait is added by the devs.

Cheers guys and hopefully the first beta will be posted later tonight my time. I'll be interested in any bugs that you find as well as improvements to the GUI.

Mark

[Dumnorix]

Hi Mark
Good news - I will test some new units first for my big normandy scenario - than next some units in our Modern war team.

Can you also produce a same editor for the efx.pzdat ?

Thank you !

Its good - different users can work on different fields !

H.Balck

[BriteLite]

Mark I will test the editor tonite when you publish. I enjoy modifying the equipment files. Thanks so much for your work.[&o]

Thanks to Dumnorix for posting the list of traits. I had overlooked the bonus trait.

[jomni]

Ah thanks.  This will help me in my unit counter replacement project.
Not really to edit the database but just clearly see what's in it.

[VPaulus]

Please, mgarnett could you please, open a thread in the Slitherine forum, about your editor?
http://www.slitherine.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=121
I could open, but I'd prefer if it was you to do it.
Thanks

[BriteLite]

Unhandled exception. String not valid time date. Will reinstall PCorps as I had made changes in original equipment file. Will advise.

EDIT: same issue after reinstall. "String was not recognized as a valid time date". I can open the equipment file however when I click anywhere in the menu I get the exception.
Any ideas?

[mgarnett]

ORIGINAL: BriteLite

Unhandled exception. String not valid time date. Will reinstall PCorps as I had made changes in original equipment file. Will advise.

EDIT: same issue after reinstall. "String was not recognized as a valid time date". I can open the equipment file however when I click anywhere in the menu I get the exception.
Any ideas?

Hi BriteLite

Could you email me a copy of your equipment file to mgarnett at optusnet.com.au

Also, could let me know the language of your windows install, I.e US English, UK English, Japanese etc.

Cheers

[BriteLite]

Sent!!

ORIGINAL: mgarnett

ORIGINAL: BriteLite

Unhandled exception. String not valid time date. Will reinstall PCorps as I had made changes in original equipment file. Will advise.

EDIT: same issue after reinstall. "String was not recognized as a valid time date". I can open the equipment file however when I click anywhere in the menu I get the exception.
Any ideas?

Hi BriteLite

Could you email me a copy of your equipment file to mgarnett at optusnet.com.au

Also, could let me know the language of your windows install, I.e US English, UK English, Japanese etc.

Cheers

[AceDuceTrey]

Again, my 2 cents. I believe all war games have it wrong punishing (-3) SPATs and Bow mounted/Fixed Turreted AT guns IN THE ATTACK. My logic is that if the vehicle is attacking, it would have its target in its (admittedly narrow) field of fire/view with " no disadvantage". But when defending, with the uncertainty of exactly where the target will appear, these small sector of fire weapons would frequently need to crank up their engine and rotate their chassies toward the target increasing their signature and delaying their ability to lay their gun on target.