New package is complete

Took longer than I thought because I had to make completely new plane sets since I rearranged a number of planes into different folders, plus I added quite a few more.

There are now 53 different sets that cover the European, Mediterranean and South Pacific theaters, from 1938 to 1946 in 6 month increments, plus a few novelty sets of night fighters and float planes.

I also managed to get every plane in my inventory into at least one of the sets. They are now set up in strict accordance with the default plane types. Meaning, single engine fighters are in single engine slots, twins in twin slots, level bombers in level bomber slots and so on.

What this means is if you choose to play a campaign, the aircraft assignments and enemy aircraft you meet will make sense. No more dive bombing He111's and such. ( Some early campaigns aren't quite as strict mainly because there weren't too many twin engine fighters but they're still pretty close to the aircraft assignment list).

I made sure that the sets stuck to the time sequence inherent in EAW. For instance, in a default EAW campaign you would start in a BF-109G and you may upgrade to a BF-109K. I've done the same thing, so for example, you might start in a BF-109B and get upgraded to a BF-109D. In addition, I put the highest performing Axis plane in each set into the Me262 slot.

As you can imagine, this took a lot of thought and planning and, of course, I salted in a few "what if" aircraft. However, they are chronologically correct. In other words you won't find an FW183 flying against a Hurricane.





In addition to the plane sets, I finished up some late war Japanese aircraft that have been sitting around the hard drive for a while. I did this because some of the SPAW plane sets were getting repetitious on the Japanese side.

J5N -

G5N -

J6K -

Ki-108 -

Ki-102 -

Ki-83 -


I added another crossover plane, the FW190 A5 since one was sent to Japan for evaluation. For fun, you could make a plane set with Japanese FW190's and Hurricanes escorting A-20's. (Little known fact. The Japanese used a dozen captured P-40b's to defend Rangoon.)


The the files have now been uploaded to our server. I'm sure when Tony gets around to it he will make a new 1.6 download available.

PS - In the FM folders I've included the various flight editors if you'd like to dabble in adjusting the flight models or loadouts. I'll be around to answer any questions in that regard.

Ray, thank you for a mighty labour of love. Wonderful. This will shorten the winter.

You are welcome, Mick.

I thought this might be a good place to post the instructions for using the PSM( Plane Set Maker) program.

============================================================================

Instructions for editing an EAW 1.6 plane set.using the Plane Set Maker program.

- Obtain PlanesetMaker.exe from Mr. Jelly's download page
- Place the program in the root folder of your EAW 1.6 installation, making sure that there is a sub folder named "Aircraft_Inventory" in there.
- Open the PSM (PlaneSetMaker) program.
- On the left side of the Level 1 screen you will see two panes. The top pane allows you to select which EAW exec you wish to use and the bottom pane allows you to select which scenario you wish to use. Both of these options are outside the scope of this document.
- In the right hand pane you will see all of the plane sets that are available in your 1.6 installation.
- Single click on any one of them and that plane set will load. A new pane will open on the left side of the screen that lists those planes.
- Click on the radio button for Level 2.
- The program will now display two panes on the right with the folder structure for the EAW 1.6 installation.
- The far left pane is for selecting which skin and aircraft model you wish to use and the near left pane is for selecting the matching flight model.
- The right hand screen is where the selection process takes place.
- For example, select plane set SPAW1940Late on the level 1 page.
- Switch to Level 2 and highlight the aircraft in Slot 00 (Bulldog)
- In the left hand panes navigate to the SPAW Planes folders, one for skins and the other for flight models(FM's)
- You will see two subfolders, Allied and Axis. You will also see that the right hand pane is broken into two sections. The top 16 blue slots (Slot00 to Slot15) are generally reserved for Allied aircraft while the bottom red 14 slots ( Slot16 to Slot29) are reserved for Axis aircraft. While you can add aircraft outside this division you will get odd results in the game, especially in campaign mode.
- In this case you will be changing the Bulldog to the F4F-3 so in the left hand pane you would navigate to the Allied folder.
- Scroll down the list of aircraft until you find the F4F-3 in both the skin and FM's folders. Double click on both subfolders.
- In the right hand pane highlight the skin folder for Slot00 (Bulldog) and double click on the name. The text will change from SPAW Bulldog to SPAW F4F-3.
- Next highlight the FM's folder and do the same thing.
- The F4F-3 has now been substituted for the Bulldog. If you wish to see that the game recognizes this change clink once on the dark green rectangular box at the bottom on the Level 2 page with the text "Save to GameData(default)"
- Enter the game and verify that your change took place.
- Repeat this step as many times as you like to produce your own plane set. When completed once again click of the "Save to GameData (default) box and enter the game to verify your changes.
- If satisfied, you will want to save your new plane set. Add a new folder name in the yellow rectangle at the bottom of the Level 2 page. ( If you have the "Save to LastSavedPS" checked it will be saved there too.). Click once in the yellow box to save the new plane set.
- Switch to the Level 1 page and you will see your new plane set has been added to the available list.

Notes:

- You can make mix and match your plane sets from any of the available aircraft in the inventory. So, you could set up a Pacific Allied set of planes vs an Italian set and so forth.

- There is only one flight model per aircraft so if you want to add a new plane but you can't find the FM in a particular subfolder, you will need to navigate to different subfolders until you find the correct one.

- The FM's and skins are not connected in any way. You can mix and match flight models with skins. Meaning, if you like the A6M3 skin rather than the A6M5 skin, you could use it with the A6M5 Flight model. This doesn't work for all planes but there are a lot of them that it will work for, such as the P-38, some FW190 variants, the P-47, P-51, some Hurricanes, some Spitfires and I'm sure a number of others.

The main difference being the type of armament because the gun ports might not be in the same position. Of course, this doesn't really stop you from doing it if you're not that concerned where the gun flashes are located.

- About the only thing you can't do is cross enemy lines. Meaning, you can't put an FW190 in an allied slot. It will still show up on the Axis side unless you edit the plane.dat file, which is what I did for the crossover planes you will find in some plane sets.

That's is a lot of work.

I am just uploading a new installation, but the 'net is slow at the moment

I HAVE REMOVED THIS DOWNLOAD BECAUSE THE PLANESETS AND INVENTORY WILL BE MADE AVAILABLE AS AN OPTIONAL UPDATE TO THE NEW "Reduced UAW160V3" INSTALLATION WHICH INCLUDES THE NEW EXEs WITH PLANESET AND THEATRE SELECTION ON THE CONFIGURATION SCREEN.

Jel

Thanks Tony I'll give it a go

Thanks Tony.

I would add that many of my earlier aircraft FM's are not as accurate as the new ones. Don't forget, some of these FM's go back quite a way and some of them aren't even mine so:

- There were major differences in the view distances where the game switches from the low res medium distance models to the hi-res close models.
- The damage models had some variations that needed standardization.
- Ammo loads, bomb loads, gun flashes, range and how the planes sit on the runways all needed adjustments.

In addition, as I went through the inventory and flew each plane, viewing the plane from outside, I found some anomalies in the models which have been corrected.

So, if you want to use the older sets, that's fine, they aren't bad by any stretch. Just be aware that the new set is more accurate.

Problems:
With the new release if you encounter any problems with the aircraft skins or flight models then contact Ray.
However, if you have any problems with the theatres, the exes, or the file-managers then contact me.

Flashing mainscreens.
The old 1.2 mainscreen had flashing colours, but the effect that worked well for that screen caused problems with other main and hangar screens, so we disabled the routine.
In the later UAW160 exes it was re-enabled, but controlled by a line in the "eaw.ini" file, which was previously used to allow or stop the introduction sequence playing.
The entry became redundant when we went from 640x480 screens to 1024x768, and the play intro routine had to be permanently disabled.
However, I have re-activated that line to control the appearance of flashing colours.


The Spanish theatre is a good test:

If I have "PlayIntro=0" I get the flashing screen
If I have "PlayIntro=1" I do not get the flashing screen

GameRanger:

As we already have a good working multiplayer set-up with a selection of scripts I will not be using the "UAW160Nov2020" folder as my GameRanger folder

Thanks to all concerned. Our little game remains alive. There is still nothing else like it.

So now, with the European, Mediterranean and Pacific theaters well in hand I'm going to set my sights on the Eastern front.

I've D/L'd all of the models I could get my hands on, mostly Russian but some Polish aircraft too, and I will go about upgrading them to the latest standard. It will probably take 4-6 months.

This is a good move. Look forward to it.

Ray
I cannot get torpedo missions to work properly with the B5N2 and the TBF.
Have you tried them?

No, I haven't. Don't know what would cause that either.

Try the FM from the prior package and see if that works. If it does I'll compare the two to look for differences.

I have no idea what set-up you are using, so things that happen on your system may not happen on mine, and vice-versa. I hosted your work as a favour, but I do not want to be fixing problems unless they are ones that I have created.
In four weeks time I will turn 79 and I do not want to be doing any more new EAW work. I am happy with the set-up that I use at GameRanger, an have no wish to change it. My only EAW related activity will be flying online there

Fine. I'll check the two FM's to see if there is a difference.

Thank you for all the work you have done for us, over the years, and happy flying for many more to come, but I hope you might reconsider.

Thanks SkyHigh
To be honest there is nothing more that I would like to do and am able to do with the EAW exe. I am not going to create any more theatres, and I have made all of the utilities that I need, so there is nothing left to do

I checked the FM's from the newest package and the one from 12-27-2019. The only difference was a shorter range and higher damage points in the new plane.dat file while the .FLT files are identical.

So then I flew a couple of torpedo missions with the new FM and the older one using the Oct12 Old Map exec. They ran exactly the same way. About 1/2 the squadron dropped torps and about 1/2 flew over the ships and just kept going.

No idea but I'm not going to pursue it, though this exchange was a good learning experience.

Thank you so much for this! Most excellent indeed.

However, I am getting an error - "pic not found plane01tra.tpc!" sometimes - though I haven't nearly scratched the surface yet with all these aircraft. It is consistently happening with the Typhoons for me, I can tell you that.

Not sure whether something is missing, or my personal install of UAW160 is messed up or I did something wrong.- seems the game at least at this point doesn't want me to use Typhoons in single or career.

To find a solution we need to know the planeset that you loaded and the aircraft you selected for a single mission.
The "plane01tra.tpc" may not be referring to the Typhoon, but to the friendly secondary or the two enemy planes.
Do not do a random selection

I just did a quick test and the problem is with the Typhoon 1B.
In the transparency link files the "plane01tx.tpc" is linked to the "plane01tra.tpc". This also applies to the 02....15 multiskins.
In the case of the Typhoon the corresponding "plane01tra.tpc" ..... "plane15tra.tpc" files are not there.

Jel

Hmmmmm, I just ran both the Typhoon1 and the Typhoon 1B(multi skin) from the new aircraft package without any errors.

The problem is in a the folder for the multiskin Typhoon.
The "plane01tx.tpc" . . . . "plane15tx.tpc" files are the multi-skin versions of "planetex.tpc" which needs a "planetra.tpc" so they are important files.

There are a couple of ways in which it might be working on your system, but not on mine or Redwolf's folder.

1. There is a rogue "plane01tra.tpc" file in your GameData folder or your root folder.
2. You have a pair of "TextMap1.str" and "TextMap2.str" files in which the "plane01tx.tpc" . . . . "plane15tx.tpc" files are all mapped to the "planetra.tpc" file.

I note that in the "ETO Hurricane 1a 303 SQ(multi)" folder there is a set of "plane01tx.tpc" . . . . "plane15tx.tpc" files and a corresponding set of "plane01tra.tpc" . . . . "plane15tra.tpc" files, so you have used them in some folders but not in the multi-skin Typhoon.

Further checking the ETO Allied planes. In all of the folders marked "multiskin" which have a set of "plane01tx.tpc" . . . . "plane15tx.tpc" files there is a corresponding set of "plane01tra.tpc" . . . . "plane15tra.tpc" files, except for the Typhoon and the Tempest.

This is what I've noticed with the Typhoon 1b: I get the freeze with randomised single missions in the early '44 planeset, but it seems to work normally with these parameters with the late '43 planeset. Would this mean that the problem lies in a plane present in '44, but not in '43?

The paths for the Typhoon 1B skins in the late '43 and early '44 planesets both have the Typhoon in Slot 13, and reference the "ETO Typhoon 1b(multi)" folder in the "Aircraft_Inventory/ETO Planes/Skins/Allies" folder.
This folder has a "PLANE01TX.TPC" texture file in it which links to the "PLANE01TRA.TPC" transparency file. The latter is not present and that causes the crash on my installation and Redwolf's.
For that matter there are also the "PLANE02TX.TPC" ..... "PLANE15TX.TPC" files in the folder which link to the "PLANE02TRA.TPC" .... "PLANE15TRA.TPC" transparency files. None of these TRA files are there either.

'43 late


'44 early


The skinfolder:

1 - No rogue "plane01tra.tpc" file in the GameData folder or my root folder so that's out.

2 - I opened the TextMap1.str" and "TextMap2.str" files but I don't know how to tell if they are mapped to the "planetra.tpc" file. I suppose this is why I don't have the problem but I am not sure.

In any case, I can make a new skin set with the missing files.

I opened the string reader twice to display the two files, and lined them up.
Note line 23

Not sure how that works. Seems to me we should all be using the same linkage set but obviously we're not.

Anyhow, I made a set of Typhoon tra files and uploaded it to the aircraft inventory folder.

I can't ell if it fixes the problem because I don't have the problem. Drop these in the Typhoon multiskin folder and let me know if it fixes the problem.

Meanwhile I'll go through all the other multiskin folders to see if the same problem exists. Once done with that I will upload an new package set.



EDIT:

I found two more sets with missing TRA files. The Tempest 5 and the DAW Ju-88A. I've uploaded zip files to fix them too. Other than that I think we're good.

I was hoping that there would be no need for me to make patches, but that is not the case

Multiskin missing TRA files
It is a 7-zip self installer, named "RayPatch01.exe"
Download it and then run it in your "UAW160Nov2020" folder, and allow it to overwrite files.
It replaces the three multiskin folders that have the "TRA" files missing with ones that contain them.
The Typhoon should work, but I did not find a planeset used the multiskin Tempest folder.

When I used the "PlaneSetExeTheatreSwitchV4.exe" the "ETO-1944 Late" planeset was not listed for selection.
If I use the "PSM160SpecialSmallSreen.exe" the planeset was listed. This is a quirk of the two file-managers.

When you select a planeset with the "PSM160SpecialSmallSreen.exe" the program looks for a file named "Planes.pco" which is a list of plane-names.
If none is found then it reads the "FMDir.set" file in the folder, and builds the "Planes.pco" file from the data in it.

However, the "PlaneSetExeTheatreSwitchV4.exe" is a much simpler program, and if the selected folder does not have the "PDir.set", the "FMDir.set" and the "Planes.pco" file in it then it does not list the planeset. Most of the plane-set folders have the three files, but the "ETO-1944 Late" planeset did not.

Having loaded it with the "PSM160SpecialSmallSreen.exe" then the "Planes.pco" was created, so the next time I used the "PlaneSetExeTheatreSwitchV4.exe" program the "ETO-1944 Late" planeset was available.

It sounds complicated, but it is not really. The best bet is to use the "PSM160SpecialSmallSreen.exe" as your file manager

1 - Any idea why the planeset was missing the .pco file?

2 - I used the less complicated program so I suppose it's possible that some other of my new plane sets will be missing.from the list.

Thanks so much to both of you for sorting this out, much appreciated!
Using PSM160SpecialSmallSreen.exe and things are looking great so far.

I'll second the above.

I notice that when I clicked on all the planesets in the SpecialSmallScreen, it built the relevant missing pco's and all the planesets are now accessible in my TheatreSwitcher.

If the "Planes.pco" file is missing the "PSM160SpecialSmallSreen.exe" makes a NULL "Planes.pco" file which is a text file.
Then it reads each of the 30 folders referenced in the "FMDir.set" file, finds the "pnames.str" file in the folder and, reads it and adds the name to the "Planes.pco" file.
When all the slots have been read it saves the "Planes.pco" file in the selected folder.
This means that the folder will now contain three files, the "FMDir.set", the "PDir.set", and the "Planes.pco" file.

The simpler version does not do this. It counts the number of files in the folder, and if it is three then it adds the planeset to the list of available ones. If it is two then it does not.

Just to clarify there is a grid in "level 2" with the folder names for the skin and FM files:


What you do not see is an invisible grid with the full path-names for these folders, and not just the folder name.
When it creates the "Planes.pco" file the exe reads the full pathnames for each slot in the invisible grid, opens the "pnames.str" file and reads it to get the name.
The simpler program has no grids in it, so it has no way af reading the names other than from the "Planes.pco" file.

This series of planesets is so comprehensive, I doubt I'll ever explore all its depths. However, there are little gems that I've already found, such as the FW 190 A-7. Apparently, only eighty were made before they moved on to the A-8. I finally worked out how to operate the Planeset Maker, so I've placed it into the slot in '44 Early previously occupied by the 190 TL. Tony's system is so flexible and Ray has offered us so many alternatives that I have the option of multiple alternatives for each biannual planeset. Thanks to all concerned.

Glad you tried out the plane set maker. It really isn't that hard to do once you get the basic concept of how the file system works.

The only caution is one I brought up in my initial post.

If you want to play campaigns keep the replacement plane similar to the original plane so that the campaign files function properly.