How to add Objects correctly with TacEdit?

[derStef]

How to add Objects correctly with TacEdit?

i'm trying to get more 3d buildings into the populated areas, to have cities that also have many 3d buildings. i'm trying this at the moment in my Taiwan theater. i added some city/Town/Village buildings by adding and copying objects.
i want to achieve a higher immersion over city areas.


wich "flags" should be set?
"supply", "priority" ?
how works the "linking mode"?
Linking objects, do i have to link then all buildings in a city to it's next building? or to all in the city? or no linking in the city?

how can i level Airbases? not able in TacEdit, right?





here a screenshot:

[Snake Man]

How to add Objects correctly with TacEdit?

On mapview, RMB click and Add Objective.

wich "flags" should be set?

I randomly checked about 20 default korean campaign city objectives, only flags were set are Flat and Needs Repairs.

"supply", "priority" ?

Supply wont matter that much, but I'm not sure.

Priority can be found at PMC Editing Wiki: Korean campaign analysis.

how works the "linking mode"?

Read PMC Editing Wiki: Links.

how can i level Airbases? not able in TacEdit, right?

Read PMC Editing Wiki: Airbase leveling of the old way and the new way using PMC Editing Wiki: Airbase Background Tiling and Leveling with CATE.

You know there is feature called search in the wiki, right?

[Sherlock]

how can i level Airbases? not able in TacEdit, right?

No you cannot level the terrain in TacEdit. You are not actually leveling the "Airbase", you are leveling the terrain (just to be clear).

Use Terrainview to level manually, or use CATE to level (with the appropriate script) many airbases at once.

[Polak]

There is never enough 3D objects on the scene to convey the feeling of the congestion of modern urban areas. However, you shot shows pretty good effort in attaining that goal. Are the FPS OK?

[molnibalage]

Cool! Can you try in in Korea for Soeul? I wish to see how is it looking.

[derStef]

Thanks for the infos, SM, but i'm looking for the "insider" info,... i know about the Wiki and most of it's contend (Campaigns)... thanks anyways....

@Polak, yes we can never reach a totally real looking urban enviornment, thats clear. but thats the best we can do...


About FPS: 18-25fps if you fly very low over the city; 25-40fps in AGL15 over the city.... needs further testing. (also there are many ground units in that area.)


@ Molni: open TacEdit and try it on your own. sorry, my friend, i have not so much time atm and have to concentrate on one.

[Snake Man]

Well ask me questions that those wiki pages don't cover and I'll do my best to help you out.

[derStef]

Well ask me questions that those wiki pages don't cover and I'll do my best to help you out.

thnaks, you are GREAT Snake Man!

[molnibalage]

@ Molni: open TacEdit and try it on your own. sorry, my friend, i have not so much time atm and have to concentrate on one.

Ok but how did you do exacly? Please tell me step-by step.

[derStef]

- open saveX.cam file with TacEdit.
- load the map in.
- right click on map, add Objective
- choose objective (City/Factory/ArmyBase/Village/Port/Powerpant/,...)
- set Flags : Fixed, Flat. depends on Object. (Airbase: set also SAM, Radar,) be aware, when you throw Airbases in, they will wave jumps in the RWY... leveling problem.. (needs TerrainView or CATE)
- setPriorities: depends on Object or Area where the object is.
THEN link mode (alt+E) and link nearby objects together.

another way is to copy existing objects. BUT be aware, those are already linked, don't put them too far away form the original object, OR remove the links.

btw i noticed that some objects that i added appear just as a "dot" in tacedit.. any advice?

i hope it helps

[molnibalage]

I don't understand. When cause your large city? What type of object did you use exatly? Didn't ask the software saving wch file? What about links in each objects that you can see the bottom part of object window?

[derStef]

I don't understand. When cause your large city? What type of object did you use exatly? Didn't ask the software saving wch file? What about links in each objects that you can see the bottom part of object window?

Cities in the center, Towns, around it with factories, then villages as suburbs.

[Sherlock]

btw i noticed that some objects that i added appear just as a "dot" in tacedit.. any advice?

That's common when you add a new objective in TacEdit no matter what kind of objective it is. Simply finish you changes for it. Do a fix objectives step and reset the flags. Then save it and exit TacEdit. When you come back in it will have the proper symbol for the objective you put in.

[derStef]

thanks for your answers!

WHAT means the green Parent ID links in Tacedit?

the "black lined" ones are for groundmoving between objects, right?
but what mean those green Parent links?

[Snake Man]

Black lines are links, green lines are parents visualization, well I guess you could call them links but the green ones has nothing to do with ground unit movement so don't get them confused together.

[derStef]

Black lines are links, green lines are parents visualization, well I guess you could call them links but the green ones has nothing to do with ground unit movement so don't get them confused together.

ok, thanks, but what means parent in that case?


also is it a bad action to copy existing units (no brigade, no div, with objID 0) and just rename them? or will that cause CTD?
same question for objects.

[Sherlock]

Black lines are links, green lines are parents visualization, well I guess you could call them links but the green ones has nothing to do with ground unit movement so don't get them confused together.

ok, thanks, but what means parent in that case?


also is it a bad action to copy existing units (no brigade, no div, with objID 0) and just rename them? or will that cause CTD?
same question for objects.

A parent (in the context of an objective) is another objective. For example, the parent of a TOWN objective would be the closest CITY objective. Note that a PAK CITY objective (priority greater than 81) is the Parent of a close non-PAK city. Depots, Army Bases, Radar stations, etc.

A parent (in the context of a Unit) is a Brigade Unit. These have specific CT's within the Falcon AF database. For example, an armor battalion would have a parent which is a Armor Brigade.

[qawa67]

looks great Stef

I've had a dream with this... Please, do your best to become it real

I'm your great fan

[derStef]

Hello Stefano!

Very nice to hear from you!

Well, i CAN add objects, but when i link them (edit the .THR file), i get constant CTDs...
as long as i link them not, it works fine.

the framedrop was NOT (or not only) caused by the groundobjects, it was caused by the many groundunits in that area.
i flew over the same area with the "standard" objects, but the same groundunits and i got more or less the same framedrop (~20fps)


as it seems the THR file is problematic in that case..

i'm still on it, but seems to be critical in many ways...

wish me the best!


cheers
Stef

[Cally]

Does anyone know what the "flat" & "mountain" flags actually do?

Many Villages & Towns are not flagged "flat," and some are even flagged "mountain" (e.g. Ko-ri town, SP4 Korea).

I'm curious if Falcon does a special job of handling these entities on sloped terrain due to these flags? If anyone has experimented or otherwise figured this out, do share.

Thx,
Cal

[molnibalage]

Many flags don't have real function. I have a guess for flat / mountain. If an object are placed on hill each item (building) should have different elevation, should have follow the terrain elevation. Maybe this is what flag does.

Check other objects in TE. When I'm making campaign I check units and object are working (?) examples.

[derStef]

i just wanted to bring the question up again.

what is the "right" way to add or edit ground objects(buildings)?

Tacedit?
i heard something about "object mover", what is that?

if someone could guide me, i could do all the object edits in Taiwan for my own.

thanks for the support.

cheers
Stef

[Snake Man]

what is the "right" way to add or edit ground objects(buildings)?
Tacedit?

Yes, that's the only way.

i heard something about "object mover", what is that?

What might sound like real arrogant answer... its object mover

[Luk]

How to add Objects correctly with TacEdit?

I think you should:
1. add objective
2. set owner
3. name it
3. set flags + priority
4. set parent
6. make links

...that is in ideal case

But I use some Eye-candy objectives too.
I use them only rarery, but wanna experiment a little bit with it:

For example these trees are not situated on routes. They are just eye-candy.
I only set the owner, dont link them. No problem in campaign.
I name them sometimes. But mostly I dont want to larger text file, so I let it nowhere.
I have an idea to substitute string "nowhere" by dot ".". I think it will look better in campaign.
Just my 0.00000000002 worth.
Luk

[ccc]

wow.. forrest looks cool.

is it made of one single objectives, or a collection of small forrest obj? i saw it(or they) sit pretty well along the slope.

[Luk]

is it made of one single objectives, or a collection of small forrest obj?

There are 5(1 hidden behind hill) objectives in the 1st. pict.

One objective are scattered trees in foreground.

Four forrest objectives are situated around the peak.
I use them because I still dont have my "objective document". Perhaps there is a single forrest objective (with middle placed origin) in database, but I dont know it. I dont know how to move axis intersection/zero point/orgin in this time. So I had to use 4 objectives to cover 4-tiles square with peak in the center.

BTW I think F4 engine is able to place objects correctly on L2 resolution slopes - despite the objective is larger, then one L2 resolution tile.

Luk

[ccc]

hmm.. i don't know.
on the slope, ground vehicle can move along the slope, no problem.
but building type obj are always vertically situated, no tilt angle.

so your forrest obj around the peak make me curious.. it just looks nicely placed.

[Luk]

It would look awfull - imagine perpedicular orientated trees. "Hedgehog hill"
I guess every object have its own origin. This is reference point for placeing on slope.
So if u know angle - you can count increment of every objects in vertical axis.

Objects are grouped into objectives. Every Objective has its origin. This "big" origin is used as reference for place in L2 grid...

Luk

[molnibalage]

How could you add trees? What about FPS hit?

It looks fine IMHO.

[Luk]

How could you add trees? What about FPS hit?

You can add them as any other objective.
And for me - it is even simplified, because I dont set so many flags for forrests.
But you must have Forrest Objective in database.
I am not db master, dont ask me how to add

F4 AF has allready Forests objectives in db.
If you want, you can add them everywhere by some simple script - trees are scattered in objective according to forrest tiles.
So your forrest tiles can be 3D.
In this case your fps should be strongly affected in forrest tiled areas.

But I put them only somewhere. I can say my FPS is ok. I run F4 on 4 years old notebook with shared memory NV 7200Go GPU and Core duo 1.6 CPU.
I have 1.5 GB RAM and win XP.
Luk

[derStef]

thanks again for your answers guys!

So, Snake Man, you think i could add/adjust every building with tacedit for my own?
should i add them into a ne_te.tac or into a campaign?

[Snake Man]

All campaign edits go to SAVE0.CAM file. Yes you can edit it, export the objectives for me in CSV file, rar it up and put for sendspace.com to download. Document your changes too.