Hi all,
Still enjoying OFF phase 3 + Hat in the ring and wondering if its possible to create mod as i had with old Red Baron 3D Hells Angles - Blue Max mod. Basicaly it replaces one sqaudron ( some Jasta 28 or 24 cant remeber exactly) with fictional jasta from Blue Max film with all its pilots from film and aircraft skins from film. It was excelent and a loved it. Dunno if OFF have possibility to specify starting squadron rooster so characters from film can be listed there or its completly random (sure they was defined as starting rooster only, in course of war they can be killed or transfered in Red Baron 3D campaing engine). I will love to see same mod for OFF too.

Phase 3 as I see it is based on history. You're asking for a total restructering of the game to allow a mythical squadron to perform mythical missions, and have mythical victories

I see the custom skin for your aircraft as a possibility, past that you're entering the Twilight Zone

Not quite Twilight Zone--it's easy to edit your PilotXXDossier.txt file in the "CFSWW1 Over Flanders Fields\campaigns\CampaignData\Pilots\" folder to change the names of your squadmates to whatever you want, including the characters from the film. As you said they'll be replaced by regularly-named folks as they are killed or transferred. Add in custom skins and you're on the right track.

You can do it for your own use YES. . But can it be offered as a mod that you can download and install, and the above condition will exist for as long as you desire it to remain . . TWILIGHT ZONE

Thanks for info. I will try start with pilots. Its possible to rename squadron i replace with Blue Max fictional one and modify default airplane textures for is pilots?

Unclean, i know OFF is based on history. Hells Angels was too. It was extremly fun to "live" war next to mates from BLue Max in this fictional fun. I loved that mod. Thats all. Just need bit help on files sturctures and how OFF works.

I'm not sure about renaming the squadron (don't be surprised if OFF freaks out, but the squadron name is line 3 of the pilot's Dossier.txt file).

If you want to dig in a little more, install OFFice and look in your C:\OBDSoftware\OFFice\config\ folder (or wherever you have OFF installed) for a file called 'dossier.keys'. This is my list of what each line in the dossier files indicates, at least the ones I've figured out. Be careful that the RosterSize line 82 matches the number of roster entries above it. You can even see how to set which pilot is your wingman if you follow my dossier.keys guide.

Uncleal has little faith in modders, despite OFF itself starting as a mod. But with the plug-in scripting engine provided by OFFice, it would be almost trivial to make an easy-to-download-and-install mod that automatically adds in the names of the Blue Max characters say if you join a certain squadron at a certain date.

What's more, with OFFbase you could model their individual personalities and relationships to be like the characters in the movie (or book!) as well, so they'd act like those characters as they have encounters with you and each other. Stachel could have Proletariat as his background trait, and definitely be a Killer and Ace--Careerist for the medal-chasing, maybe Egotist as well. You wouldn't want to argue over a kill with him, that's for sure. The book Stachel would have Heavy Drinker as his primary trait.

Doing the research (reading the book / watching the movie over and over) to define the characters and relationships would probably take more time than actually programming the Automatic Blue Max Character Mod.

If you haven't tried OFFbase yet, ataribaby, give it a shot and I think you'll pretty quickly see the potential for the unique kind of immersive experience you're hoping to create. And as I said, it's extremely modable. I've just uploaded version 0.7.9 of the OFFice suite to both SimHQ and Combat Ace, so hopefully 0.7.9 will be available at one or both soon.

Excelent info Lothar. Thanks. I will investigate both tools. With personalities you hit nail into head. Exactly what i want from "movie" addon. To live with that characters on front. Got 7.9 version from CombatAce.

It's not soo much that Uncleal has no faith in modders, actually for the most part they do very good work

But at the same time I wonder how many features were intended for OFF and remained on the cutting room floor because some of it's eventual effects on different aspects of the game. These character flaws if you will, were only exposed by actual testing on many different systems. OBD approves of any mod that won't make the aircraft fly backwards, but as far as testing . . I'm doing it
If those standards are acceptable to you ....Fine

As for me they're Not

Any luck with OFFbase, ataribaby? Hopefully you can see the potential.

Also, bumped into the following skins at Combat Ace:
http://combatace.com/files/file/9630-bruno-stachel-pfalz-jasta-23b-1918/
http://combatace.com/files/file/9534-willi-von-klugermans-dr1/

There may be more, deserves some exploring.

Just installed OFFBase and briefly flew it. Not expolored or tried modify something with it yet. Looks good. Thanks for skins i will search for more.