Readme for Moggy's Aircraft Carrier (USS Yorktown)
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This is very much work in progress!

These files should be added toyour EAW folder after you have loaded a "blue water" pacific terrain (any land based airfield also using this airbase file number will also appear as the carrier!). By all means kill off extraneous mods in wehatever way you usually do, but be careful of killing off the hangars which this add on turns into destroyers.

Use the carrier by starting a single mission from the pacific equivalent of Hawkinge.


The files with this package are:


airfld06.3dz 
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This is a renamed version of airfld10.3dz, stripped down to leave only one long section of runway visible.

I used the filename airfld06 as it is the base file for Hawkinge.


cv.tpc/Yorktown2.pcz
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This is the skin file for the runway section, which appears as the carrier flight deck. It is picpacked from file Yorktown2.pcx. The pcx shows how the scan of the carrier deck has to be distorted so that when it is applied to the runway section it achieves it proper proportions. 

It is also neccessary to place the flight deck in the runway section so that the aircraft take off point is as far to the end of the deck as possible. 

There are remaining parts of the pcx which could be more accurately painted to the right sea colour, and with some artistry perhaps to provide a carrier wake.

There is scope here to produce deck scans for US, Japanese, and British carriers. Possibly even Italian. Some fun may be had in getting hold of some plans for the German carrier which was never completed and commisioned.


Tmod25_h.3dz
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This is an edited version of the airbase control tower, shaped to look something like the USS Yorktown superstructure. 

Likewise individually edited mods can be produced for the other carriers


Tower.tpc
Towers.tpc
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These are simply the EAW default skin files grnd02.tpc and grnd02s.tpc which skin the control tower. Some scope here for skinners to produce more realistic looking carrier type colours.


Tmod27 all files
Tmod30 all files
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These turn hangars and other building into destroyers and cargo ships


Tardata.dat
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This is the EAW file that arranges all the target mods in airbases and other locations. The Hawkinge section which is Group "5E" at offset 17784(hex) has been edited to remove mods not turned into ships, and to move the control tower (Tmod25 - 19(hex)) to the proper place on the carrier deck.


Further development
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Moving the airbase flak mods to the positions ofthe carrier AA turrets - the flak mods can be restored in tardata.dat and moved into position by adjusting the coordinates.


Outstanding problems
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The wingmen don't have enough space to get down.

We need to work on something to imitate catapaults and arrester wires. Comment on the forum suggests the flight model can be tweaked for extra breakpower. Perhaps extra acceleration can also be achieved in the same way.

Can we lift the flight deck off the surface?

I don't know. I haven't found any numbers in tardata.dat or targets.dat yet which might achieve this. 

Perhaps some illusion of a hull could be created by putting a low 3d frame around the deck. This would have to take the name of one or more unused mods (the deleted ones - such as the barracks - could be restored) and moved into position by editing tardata.dat


What can we achieve?
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I had in mind producing something like a Coral Sea/Midway "blue water" type scenario. 

Having broken into tardata.dat and targets.dat it is possible to remove airbases, towns and all associated mods. 

We could produce a cleaned up pacific map which has (for example) just 10 airbases left, in appropriate positions. As there are 10 airbase files, all could be different US, Japanese, (and British Task Force 57!) carriers. There would be plenty of single mission possibilities here. I don't know what could be done with a campaign.



Moggy
29th October 2000





