Cold War 46 Skirmish Mod 1.4

[Paul59]

This mod allows hypothetical Skirmish battles to be generated between US and Soviet forces in 1946. It supposes that the Western Allies and the Soviets fell out after the defeat of Nazi Germany, resulting in a Soviet Invasion of Western Germany.

Features include:

1) A full roster of late war US units from BA1, but also including four units added by other modders; M26 Pershing (to give the US something to match the IS-2!), 105mm Towed Howitzer, M20 Scout Car, and T19 HMC Halftrack 105mm Howitzer.

2) I have given the Americans a fighter plane by converting the P47 Ground Attack plane into a fighter. The US also has the P47 Ground Attack plane, and a British Typhoon for ground attack duties.

3) There is a GERMANY terrain pack included which you can select. It uses the western European houses from BA1.








How to install

A new version of this mod is now available for download within the game using the Download Community Scenarios button.


How to use

Open BA2 and select "Skirmish" from the main menu. Click the "Advanced" button in the middle of the screen. Click "Use Default Data" in the bottom right of the screen. This will bring up a list of campaigns and mods that you have installed, so select "Cold War 46 Skirmish 1.2". Then just select your Skirmish preferences in the normal way and click "Create".


This mod also includes the Improved Engineer Mod by Amaris;

http://amaris-games.com/ba-amaris/improved-engineer/

Engineers, including Engineer vehicles such as the Soviet PT34 and US Sherman Rhino, can now use the following new functions:

Add Tank Traps: Select Engineer unit. Right click and select "ADD TANK TRAP" icon.

Remove Tank Traps: Move Engineer unit into Tank Trap Tile. Right click and select "REMOVE TANK TRAP" icon.

Cut hedgerows: To use, start the Engineer unit adjacent to a hedgerow and right click on the other side, select "CUT HEDGE".

Burn High Vegetation: Move Engineer unit into a High Vegetation Tile. Right click and select "BURN" icon.

Destroy Bridge: To use, start the Engineer unit adjacent to a destroyable bridge, and right click on the bridge tile, select "BLOW UP".

Remove Wire: This option is redundant in Skirmish games because the Skirmish generator does not place any wire.

Add Minefield: To use, start the Engineer unit adjacent to a tile you want to mine, and right click on that tile, select "ADD MINEFIELD".

All these actions uses up all the Engineer unit's APs for the turn.

For more instructions and screenshots, see Amaris' page above. Note that I have not added the "Add Pontoon Bridge" function, as it was not working properly in this mod.

The AI does not appear to use these Engineering functions, so it is up to the player if he wants to use these or not. Some may feel that it gives the player an unfair advantage, so just don't use them.

Engineers retain their vanilla abilities of laying smoke and clearing minefields etc.

Also many thanks to Amaris and Petcat for the additional units in the mod, M26 Pershing, 105mm Towed Howitzer, M20 Scout Car, and T19 HMC Halftrack 105mm Howitzer.


enjoy!

Paul

[rico21]

I'm in!

[PoorOldSpike]

Haha great mod..

"I would have you tell the Red Army where their border is, and give them a limited time to get back across.
Warn them that if they fail to do so, we will push them back across it." (Gen. George Patton after VE day)

[best75]

Cool, now to see the allies and soviets face off against each other.

[Eagletanker]

Played a few matches, it pretty good. You need to add the post war soviet tanks like the IS3 and SU 100.

[Paul59]

Played a few matches, it pretty good. You need to add the post war soviet tanks like the IS3 and SU 100.

If I had the right models I would.

[Paul59]

I have updated the mod to version 1.3. The link is in the first post.

I have updated the US objective flags and Sideicons. Previously I was lazy, and just used the textures from BA1, but I have now made new designs similar in style to those I have used in some of my previous mods, ie the Spanish Civil War.







I have also added the unit textures for the US 75mm GMC which may have been missing in the previous version.


cheers

Paul

[Paul59]

I have updated the mod to version 1.4. The link is in the first post.

I noticed that the US M3 halftracks and Airborne Jeeps BA1 unit points costs were seriously below the BA2 levels. These have been changed.

[Fluffi]

I feel like a kid in a candy shop seeing this; seeing all these new mods and add-ons to the game suddenly pop up after about two years or so of quietness (at least for BA1, been about a year for BA2 at least it feels like) makes me so giddy on the inside because it makes me feel like there's something BIG that's going to happen in the future (BA3 possibly?). Anyways, I'm going to have a lot of fun with this mod, great work once again paul!

[nmkt72]

Any change of Slitherine hosting this officially? Like the Enhanced Random Skirmish Mod. So that us ipad players could enjoy this also. Pip?

[Paul59]

I give my permission for this, and all my other posted Skirmish mods, to be hosted by Slitherine.

[Fluffi]

Played a few matches, it pretty good. You need to add the post war soviet tanks like the IS3 and SU 100.

If I had the right models I would.

As far as the SU-100 goes, all you'd have to do is take the SU-85, make the gun longer and add a Cupola like on the T-34 1943, and just change the AP and HE stats on the unit (armor practically is unchanged save for 75mm of frontal sloped armor I believe). The IS-3 though would require modelling from scratch and thus would be a lot more difficult to bring to the game. If I actually had some modelling experience I could help with this, but as it stands I'd say you're out of luck with getting more custom models.

On another note, I've been meaning to ask how you made the KV-85 and T-20 tractor models, given that the Katyusha, T-35, and Pershing all come from PetCat and I'm mostly certain that units like the Flak30 and Maus come from Amaris's models (I'm not going to talk about the Jagdtiger model since afaik there's been attempts to get it to be properly-sized but without much success).

Apologies if all of this is a bit much to ask, I'm generally curious about how the models are made and whatnot.

[Paul59]

Yes, I could do the SU100 by just using the SU85 model, but it would have to be unaltered, as I have no way of lengthening the gun or adding a cupola. The stats are not a problem, I am perfectly capable of doing those, but I have no 3d modelling skills at all.

I did create the KV85 and Komsomolets tractor models, but that was not by 3d modelling!

The .s4f models in the game are encrypted versions of the original .s3f models, and they cannot be altered. However, the .s3f models for the Soviet units have been left in the game files. I don't know why, none of the other .s3f files have been. Luckily, the info in the .s3f files is all in huge blocks of readable text. So to create the Komsomolets tractor I opened the SU57 .s3f file and found the blocks of text that relate to the gun model, and deleted them.

To create the KV85, I opened the KV1 .s3f model, deleted its turret text blocks, and replaced them with the text blocks for the T34/85 turret. The turret sits a little bit too low on the KV hull, but there is nothing I can do about that, and it looks fine from a distance.

This method of modelling via manipulating the .s3f text blocks is very limited. As I already said, you can't change the positioning of a turret or other piece, so some conversions just do not work. Also, you have to be lucky with the texture file, sometimes the piece you want to swap uses a part of the texture that is already used for something else.

The .s3f file is automatically converted to a .s4f file by the game when it is first loaded. You can then delete the .s3f from the game folders.

[Fluffi]

Well, I didn't exactly know it was that complicated to be honest. I guess the only other way you could really make the SU100 differnet from the SU85 would be giving it a different texture (which is likely another problem in of itself as well) but otherwise I see what you're getting at.

I'll be honest and say I wasn't prepared for how complex all of this is, as I don't have any tools to access the files you are referring to outside of the CSV (and even then when I open the CSV in something like Word Pad it just comes up messy). But from what I'm taking out of your explanation it seems that creating units from existing ones is possible but very limited, which does cause a bit of an issue for some of the ideas I had in mind. That aside, I should ask you what kind of application/tool that you use to open .s3f and .s4f files, as currently I have none right now. (also what tool to use to open DDS images, as I also don't have any means of viewing them).

[Paul59]

Well, I didn't exactly know it was that complicated to be honest. I guess the only other way you could really make the SU100 differnet from the SU85 would be giving it a different texture (which is likely another problem in of itself as well) but otherwise I see what you're getting at.

I'll be honest and say I wasn't prepared for how complex all of this is, as I don't have any tools to access the files you are referring to outside of the CSV (and even then when I open the CSV in something like Word Pad it just comes up messy). But from what I'm taking out of your explanation it seems that creating units from existing ones is possible but very limited, which does cause a bit of an issue for some of the ideas I had in mind. That aside, I should ask you what kind of application/tool that you use to open .s3f and .s4f files, as currently I have none right now. (also what tool to use to open DDS images, as I also don't have any means of viewing them).

Complicated! Real 3d modelling is a thousand times more complicated than the process I explained.

These are the tools you need to open the files;

For the .csv files I use Microsoft Excel. I think there is a free program that someone suggested to me recently, but off the top of my head I can't think what it is. You need a special program like this otherwise you will just get nonsense if you open the .csv file in Wordpad.

For the .s3f and .s4f files I use Notepad++, which is free to download.

For the .txt files I just use the normal Notepad.

For the .dds files I use an old version of Paint Shop Pro 7, but Paint.Net is free and I am told that it does the job. Don't bother trying to find Paint Shop Pro 7, it probably will not work on a modern PC! I dread the day my old PC finally dies and I have to get a Windows 10 machine, I will have to learn how to do graphics on a newer program!

[Paul59]

A new version of this mod is now available for download within the game using the Download Community Scenarios button.

I have, therefore, deleted the Mediafire link for the old version in the first post of this thread.

Changes in version 1.5:

Priest SP gun given direct fire capability against armoured targets.

[rico21]

Started!
Indochina, Korea, Vietnam...
Tonkin first.
If you want you can include Paul.
Thanks.

[PoorOldSpike]

Tonkin first.

I was wiped out in Tonkin, I never stood a chance, haha.
I might do better at the second attempt, but it's pure luck whether anybody can win.
I can't say any more in case it spoils the surprise..

[rico21]

http://indochine54.free.fr/vm/tiger.html

[stephenterrell]

Thanks for giving BA2 a new lease of life.

I have been experimenting with altering the points for each side after selecting very large map and very large force (Wilderness defend). Something strange seems to happen to the Soviet force size if i give it around 4800 points. It often results in a very small force of perhaps 10-20 infantry and a few tanks. Nothing like the size of force that it could have been. Sometimes it generates the size of force that would be expected so it is rather confusing.
Somewhere between 4000 and 5000 points something seems to occasionally go wrong. Is this a known problem?