for Gophur's To-Do List

[ratatosk]

ok, it's not a bug as such, but I didn't know where else to post a request that the stuff on battlegroundtools.com be brought up to date. I mean like the AI emplacement maps & town altitude charts- the maps are mostly wrong now and while I don't guess altitudes have changed, there are towns in the game that are not on the chart. In fact, it would be nice to display altitude along with gps info, but at least get the chart updated.

I don't know if CRS put this stuff together originally or not, but it just hasn't been maintained. Sounds like a good job for TIMMEH to take on.

[sgtfury]

That was done by players not the RATS.

[ratatosk]

ah, well ok. But it appears that CRS let the players into some stuff that isn't normally available- at least my maps have never been as legible as those since the beginning of 2007 and I assume that the town elevations came off of a contour map that was used to model the terrain.

At any rate, this stuff is very useful and it would be nice if it was maintained whether by CRS or players. I don't mind spending some time on it if others will help as well.

[GOPHUR]

Yeah I can't fix that. Sorry.

[JOKER007]

ah, well ok. But it appears that CRS let the players into some stuff that isn't normally available- at least my maps have never been as legible as those since the beginning of 2007 and I assume that the town elevations came off of a contour map that was used to model the terrain.

At any rate, this stuff is very useful and it would be nice if it was maintained whether by CRS or players. I don't mind spending some time on it if others will help as well.

Players flew to the towns, inverted, took screenshots and then created the maps. They also landed at the town and noted the altitude at ground level.

LOTS of work, very well done. Takes a motivated player with a caffeine addiction (all the meth addicts just tweak'd out and attacked their monitors to stop the snakes coming out).

JOKER007

[jwilly]

(...)I assume that the town elevations came off of a contour map that was used to model the terrain.

Not quite. The game world actually is built from an 800 meter square grid of geomeasuring-satellite-originated Earth elevation data ("DEM", or digital elevation mapping, data), with 800 meter world tiles laid in a corresponding pattern with the resulting vertices at elevations per the DEM data. The Multi-Gen world editing system provides that capability.

Since each game town is located within a tile, its elevation is intermediate between DEM data points, depending on its exact location.

Game town locations are synthesized from the characteristics of the necessarily limited variety of the tileset, plus the half-scale nature of the game world. None of the game's features are directly based on aerial photography, for instance. Everything is approximated per what can be constructed with the tileset.

That, for instance, is why only the most important real towns and other terrain features are game-modeled. The half-scale model plus the limitations of the tileset prevent every detail of every real-world feature from being reproduced in the game world.

[ratatosk]

Players flew to the towns, inverted, took screenshots and then created the maps. They also landed at the town and noted the altitude at ground level.

LOTS of work, very well done. Takes a motivated player with a caffeine addiction (all the meth addicts just tweak'd out and attacked their monitors to stop the snakes coming out).

JOKER007

gadzooks, that is as interesting as it is impressively crazy! Is there some reason why CRS couldn't just do the same thing in 1/30th the time using the Buzzard? Other than resources, which is why I originally suggested that TIMMEH would be a good candidate. Thanks for the info.

[ratatosk]

Not quite. The game world actually is built from an 800 meter square grid of geomeasuring-satellite-originated Earth elevation data ("DEM", or digital elevation mapping, data), with 800 meter world tiles laid in a corresponding pattern with the resulting vertices at elevations per the DEM data. The Multi-Gen world editing system provides that capability.

Since each game town is located within a tile, its elevation is intermediate between DEM data points, depending on its exact location.

Game town locations are synthesized from the characteristics of the necessarily limited variety of the tileset, plus the half-scale nature of the game world. None of the game's features are directly based on aerial photography, for instance. Everything is approximated per what can be constructed with the tileset.

That, for instance, is why only the most important real towns and other terrain features are game-modeled. The half-scale model plus the limitations of the tileset prevent every detail of every real-world feature from being reproduced in the game world.

Thanks for explaining, what you are describing is essentially the same accuracy as triangulating location between cell phone towers provides I think. At any rate, the other approach would be to just spend an afternoon on Teh Internets looking up the elevations of cities and airports (assuming the latter correlate to their WW2 locations). Nothing is going to be exact, but neither will the bombing be even if it was.

[frantish]

ok' date=' it's not a bug as such, but I didn't know where else to post a request that the stuff on battlegroundtools.com be brought up to date. [/quote']

The BGE Wiki does have complete altitudes

http://wiki.battlegroundeurope.com/index.php/Town_Altitudes

and other info.

Tools still useful, but parts are dated as you seen, and I do not thing being actively updated (unlike wiki). Still a good site.

[timmy41]

*smacks rata*

[Hinfoos]

*smacks rata*

dooooo eeeeeet

[AHWULF]

Someday when I'm bored I might try to do something to take pix of each town. What might be useful to see - 3d or topdown?

No promises on when, but I could automate this.

Note this is on my own time...

[adoniram]

Someday when I'm bored I might try to do something to take pix of each town. What might be useful to see - 3d or topdown?

No promises on when, but I could automate this.

Note this is on my own time...

I think topdown is better as 3d would have the shots angled and then you really need shots from different directions for each town to cover it all...

[ratatosk]

The BGE Wiki does have complete altitudes

http://wiki.battlegroundeurope.com/index.php/Town_Altitudes

and other info.

Tools still useful, but parts are dated as you seen, and I do not thing being actively updated (unlike wiki). Still a good site.

good, this is good, yes! Thanks.

[ratatosk]

*smacks rata*

but this would be your opportunity to shine, TIMMEH! ;p