Mobhack For Steel Panthers - Main Battle Tank (SPMBT)

Help File


Introduction

Basics

Load/Save tab

Tool Bar Buttons & Menu Items

Info Tab

Units Tab

Weapons Tab

Formations Tab

General Editing Notes & Rules

The AI Pick List

Database check utilities


Introduction

Mobhack is a data file editor for the World War II wargames developed by the SP-Camo Workshop, based on the original Steel Panthers 2 - modern battles source code released to us by SSI.

It used to work on the files known as 'mobs' from their format mobxx. These files have been much increased in size - from version 3.0 of SPWW2, they are called 'spobs' Steel Panthers Order of Battle Files. For SPMBT - they are called obat files.

Each file is used for a specific nation, e.g. obat44 is West Germany, obat12 the US Army etc. And each one holds the basic game data for the Units, Weapons and Formations used in the game.

SPWW2 spob format differs from the standard SSI SP2 product - do not edit SP2 mobs with this editor, and do not edit SP Camo order of battle files in any editor other than the one released with each product - SPWW2 and SPMBT file formats differ!.

This program is designed for experienced users only, or those who wish to learn by experimentation - therefore the only help available will be this file, and no support calls will be taken for this product other than proper bug reports. The 'hack' part of the product name points to the intended user audience - hackers, people willing to dig around and teach themselves. You may try asking the more experienced users on the SP Camo discussion board at (link) - originally set up for SPWW2, this message board covers all SP Camo games now.

Remember - this programme is provided as an 'extra' for your personal use. It is unsupported. However, you may be able to get help by asking a question at the SP Camo MBT discussion group http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SPMBT

This version is for the MBT extension to SP Camo's SPWW2.

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Basics

Before editing your OB files, first back the original file set up in a zip file or similar archive, in case of errors!.

Remember that any edits you do will possibly trash any scenarios provided with the game, or from third parties - you may need to re load the default OB files in order to play scenarios, or to play another player in PBEM, as in PBEM your obat files must be exactly the same throughout the entire game - changing or modifying an OB file while you have a PBEM game in progress will almost assuredly invalidate the game due to OB checking errors (anti cheat tests). Additionally - changing an OB in the middle of an ongoing campaign will possibly produce unexpected results, as will re loading any saved game where the underlying OB data was modified. In other words - if you are not using the default OB files as issued by SP Camo Workshop, caveat emptor - any problems are of your own making.

One way to get round this is to install a default version of the game, and only use the issued OB files here - use this copy for playing scenarios, and to PBEM any users who do not want to install your modified OB. You may need to install a completely new copy of the game into a further directory, for example to play Joe, who only uses his OB mods - only use this copy of the game to play Joe, after installing his OB files.

Scenarios are particularly sensitive to any OB file changes, especially to the weapons data. If you are a scenario or user campaign designer, then you should stick to the SP Camo Issued OB files, making desired changes in the scenario editor in-game if you want to distribute your scenario to other users. Otherwise - even if you issue the scenario with your home made OB - a lot of the end users will not install your OB, and complain about your broken scenario, or will install your OB over the default SP Camo ones, and then complain that the in game scenarios etc are broken. Any problems such as these are your support calls, not ours at SP Camo!. If you issue your OOBS or any scenarios or user campaigns (which are packages of scenario files) using your modified OOBS to the general public - provide a contact email address for users to get support from you.

Moral is - back up your files, and be very careful about randomly issuing or installing OB files not issued by SP Camo themselves. Keep an official copy of the game for playing scenarios, and PBEM and so on - drop your mods into a second copy of the game and use for hack work.

Large Fonts

Some folk run Windows with 'large fonts' - Mobhack is meant to be run with the normal Windows font. If you cannot see the Open, Save etc buttons on the right - resize the window by dragging in the normal windows manner as necessary, but changing back to normal windows font size is the best thing to do, prior to a session with Mobhack.

Running Mobhack

Once you have backed up your original OB files, run the programme - you will find this in the Mobhack folder under the main game folder.

You may need to set up the Mobhack INI file, if you have installed the game elsewhere than the default.

Open the ini file in a text editor (such as notepad) - never a WP programme such as Word, which does not operate in plain ASCII text!!. You will see something like:

[Mobhack]
DefaultDir=c:\spmbt
Hints=1 [When new to Mobhack - set hints to 1 for ON - to aid you with pop up messages]
HintDelay=5

Edit the default dir path to wherever you have installed the game, Hints is 1 or 0 (on or off) and the hint delay can be increased to give more time for the hint pop up to appear if desired - do not alter any other line in the INI file. (Changing "Medium Tank" to say "My Tank" in the Mobhack INI file will do nothing other than change the string shown in Mobhack - it will not change the Game data, which will still show "Medium Tank" !).

Mobhack is set up to be run from the pre-set directory in the SPMBT series - it automatically loads the shape (shp) files from the SHP directory and the unit picture files (LBM) from the PIC dir. Mobhack therefore is not stand alone - it needs these support files to work.

The first thing you need to do is to load up an OB file - double click from the list shown, or select an OOB then press OPEN. (If no list is shown then you have not set up the default working directory where your OB files reside in the INI file - see above) - NB you can use the directory list to navigate to some other place, perhaps where a back up set of OBs live, if desired. Files not found will be marked with a query.

Transparent Colour

The code to display the shape files does not seem to like some graphics modes. It runs fine in 32 bit True colour, and in 256, but 15 bit High colour can cause problems with the transparency - this allows you to try one of the 256 colours in the SP Palette - 0 to 256 - try 255 or 254 if you require to work in 15

bit colour for some reason.

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Load/Save tab

Open button - for those who like to select from the list, then hit a button. Double clicking the nation name in the list is faster.

Save button - to save the changes you make and overwrite the original file on disk. Important point! - the editor changes you do are held in RAM, and are only archived to disk from this button - many new users make changes in the program, then exit without pressing this button, and wonder why these changes do not appear in the game. (The earlier versions of this editor did not have the reminder nag screen on exit, this was introduced to provide the hint to such).

Save As button - lets you save the OB in question as another file (any name you like) - advanced users could use this to say, overwrite another OB in another directory. No safety check or sanity check - save it as fred.dat, and you will of course not be able to load it in again till renamed properly!.

Dump CSV button - This dumps 3 Comma Separated Value (CSV) files for the currently loaded OB file - these can be read by such spreadsheet programs as Excel or database programs like Access. This is for internal SP Camo team usage, and is meant to provide a data dump for comparisons, data checking and so on. There are no guarantees that all the data fields are in there, this facility is an unsupported extra to an unsupported product!. (To answer an oft asked question - there is deliberately no CSV import, as the only method used in early versions of the editor had zero error checking. Adding Error checking would have taken too much effort. Too many folk used a spreadsheet or similar and then uploaded duff data, so this was removed, and the facility is only included for output now). It is very useful for checking consistency,

Help button - Calls this file up.

Exit Button - Gets you out of the program.

NB - there is a size grip in the bottom right corner - you can increase the form size, if desired - e.g. if using windows large fonts setting.

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Tool Bar Buttons & Menu Items

These are common across most all edit tabs.

Toolbar Buttons

Erase Button - this blanks out the data for the current edit item. It does NOT delete it!.

Copy Button - You can copy the currently selected item (Unit, Weapon or Formation) to a set of paste buffers here, or select 'all' to copy all the current data.

Paste Button - Select a copied item from the buffer and paste to the currently selected item, this does NOT save the data. Selecting 'all' will copy all the buffers currently pasted to, and will save the changes to memory.

Move To Button - Moves this item to another slot, overwriting the target if filled, this does save to memory.

Move forward and move back VCR buttons - one click moves you forward or back 1 item in the list, a right click moves you in increments of 10.

Cancel button - Undoes any changes made since the last save event. [F9]

Save Button - saves the current item's data to memory. Note that this is the ONLY way to save your changes to memory - moving off the current item has the same effect as a cancel (all changes not saved are lost). [F12] note that this will only save your changes to the OB data held in memory - you require to save to file to put your changes into effect!. (see Save button above, or the save file menu item below)

Find Edit Box and Button - Enter a partial string to search on and hit enter (while still in the edit box) or [F3] or [F11] to find the first item containing that sub string. All searches go forwards, and wrap. Use [F3] or [F11] as a search again function. (Example - "62" will find T-62, T 62A etc.)

Menu Items

File/Save Current File - saves from memory overwriting the current OB data file. [Ctrl-S]

File/Write CSV files - same as Dump CSV button above

File/Reclassify - Allows you to change all things of 1 class to another (Say MBT to Medium Tank) - useful if you have just imported a bunch of say tanks classed as MBT from another OOB, but your OOB uses medium Tank as its basic tank category.

File/Renationalise - Allows you to Renationalise all units and formations of 1 nation code to another - useful again once again if you have imported a batch of things from another OOB.

File/Save File As - same as Save As button above.

File/Change Transparent Colour - See transparent Colour above.

Grid - see grids below (if released in the final public version).

Help/Help - Brings this file up.

Help/About - Has version number, and links to the Wargamer and the Yahoo SP discussion site (for questions etc.)

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Info Tab

This tab allows you to input version number information to the OB data.

The string appears at the foot of the Encyclopaedia page as an indicator to the end user as to which data set is in use.

If you change the data in an SP Camo OB - you must change this string, in order to avoid confusing either yourself, or anybody you may distribute your changed OOB to. Especially as when playing a PBEM game, the save game includes a checksum validation of both OB files in use when the PBEM game commences - if you get a save game load failure because somebody has changed an OB file in the middle of the PBEM game's progress, this string gives you a quick way to check the version ID OB file currently loaded, assuming you remembered to change the version string for your own changes and on any subsequent change. Put the date in, and since SP players are world wide - do not use the DD/MM/YY format - use 'April' or 'Apr' - as different countries use different orders - USA used MM/DD/YY for example, so 03/04/2002 parses different ways in different parts of the globe. Minor point, but this date format thing has caused hiccups to me in several projects where different countries were involved.

Always use a letter format for the month for clarity world-wide - 03/April/2002 (the previous example) would then be properly parsed by an American, while a Brit getting April/03/2002 from an American would get that right, but would parse 04/03/2002 as 4th March 2002.

A trivial little point perhaps, but it has had unintended effects in several cross - Atlantic projects I have worked on, when discussing say delivery dates and other contractual items!.

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Units Tab

SP games are based on units, 1 per vehicle (generally - some may represent say 2 jeeps), Section (USA='Squad') of infantry, support weapons and so on.

There is a list of the units on the left - go directly to a unit and click on it, or use the VCR controls on the toolbar to navigate (right click to jump several)

When a unit is selected on the LHS, the data fields are shown on the RHS.

Name - the unit name, 15 characters max. (All text in the game must be USA ASCII!! - funny cedillas and other things may display in Mobhack, but will do strange things and possibly crash the actual game). do NOT 'pad' the right hand side of the name with spaces as that screws up in-game displays - this version of Mobhack now automatically trims trailing spaces in any case in names. Do not use characters or character sequences that are significant inside the 'C' programming language ("\n" may cause unexpected screen corruption - "&" needs to be "&&" etc).

Nation - the integer number of that nation - name is reported at the top, above unit name. If you want to temporarily remove something from the game but not delete its data - Renationalise this to a nation other than the main OB. Any unit slot that is actually unused must be set to nation 0 (unused) or the slot may appear in the game as a fortification with (usually) a blank name - these will show up as blank bars in the purchase screen or encyclopaedia, and will crash the game if chosen (the AI will happily do so!) - so you have been warned - if you do not use a slot, set its nation to 0 and type to 0. The pick list of nations is available from the ellipsis button to the right of this field, you do not need to enter the number directly, unless you so desire.

Unit Class - This number represents the unit class. Some unit classes are meant to be set up as of map units (e.g. aircraft and artillery units). Unit classes are set out in the Game Guide. Remember that some unit classes will exhibit strange behaviour if incorrectly used or edited (e.g. armouring some soft classes). It is up to you to figure what works and what does not.

Move Class - each unit class has a default movement class in built into the game code, which you can override here. For example, trucks use wheeled movement - you may want an 8 wheeled higher mobility carrier - so change to AT-Wheel (Which seems to be All Terrain Wheel - use this for any 4WD or greater). The only way to find out what the default is for yo to drive a unit of this type set to default around the battlefield, there is no public list of the defaults. For infantry type classes and air units - leave 0. For vehicles, it is best to override with the desired movement class type. Note that it is perfectly acceptable to have say, an 'APC-Halftrack' class with move class 'wheeled' - you may for example have formations which mainly use a half track APC, but is available with a secondary wheeled APC (say M3 half tracks with a few in Walids).

Availability fields - Month and year the unit is first available from, and last month and year that unit can be purchased. Do not reverse these!. Set outside the game period of 1/1946 to 12/120 for unused unit slots. NB - the year 2000 is year 100 in our date scheme, therefore year 120=2020. Do not leave gaps between units if the formation used inside covers the gap date!.

Sound - use this to override the in game sound used for this unit, though - be aware that the code will ignore this in some circumstances, so you will need to check this in game. Also note - one of these overrides is some truck classes with speed of 6 points or less - this was the original horse drawn fix, and was left in as some OB designers wanted to have both trucks and horse wagons available for purchase in the same formations.

Cost - The cost to buy one of these items, at 70 experience points. It is up to you to determine this - look at other things and see how your unit relates in capability, for that date range as well.

Crew - the number of men in a rifle section, or vehicle crewmen etc. Acts as a form of 'hit point' system - 8 man rifle sections last longer than 5 men, a soft skinned vehicle with 4 crew will tend to take more rifle hits than an equivalent with 1. Vehicle 'damage points' in the game (* messages) - usually mean 1 crewman disabled, as well as sometimes removing weapons etc.

Size - between 0 and 6 usually. Smaller is more difficult to spot, to hit and so on. A size 1 infantry section is not the same size as a size 1 vehicle. Size 0 is for snipers and similar types only.

Carry - numbers less than 100 is the number of men. 100 series numbers carry things with 1 '*' beside their names, 200 series 2 *s (ie heavier field pieces). look at various APC, truck, barge classes for guidance. In general - APC classes protect their crew - unprotected classes which get hit, the passengers will dismount, possibly taking damage. '6' means 6 men weight can be carried - 106 means a small support weapon with about 6 crew can be carried (small mortar or AT gun etc). SP games make no differentiation between 'towed' and 'carried'.

Weight - this is an arbitrary code number which if not 0, means this thing will add extra on top of the crew number to the carry cost. An MMG unit with 6 men and weight code of 1 - takes rather more than 6 carry to lift!. Mostly used for guns, vehicles etc., most mobile infantry support weapons will tend to be 0.

LBM - SP uses an old Atari file format for pictures of units. It is only supported by some paint packages, and it is palletised - you will need to apply the correct palette if making your own, or the pictures will appear as 'mush' in the game (even if appearing OK in Mobhack - remember the game is the final arbiter of 'rightness' - not Mobhack!). This palette is especially limited with respect to colour pictures. Colour pictures must NOT be used for normal unit pix - there are a few Colour LBM in designated LBM numbers, but these are used on special in game pages which know about colour - use of coloured LBM elsewhere can cause crashes or weird effects!. All LBM require to be 160 by 80 pixels, or crashes or weird effects can occur!. You can type in the LBM number here directly, or use the ellipses button to bring up the LBM picker. Centre picture is the current one - select one of the other 9 to make it current, type in the number, or use the list box at the side to pick.

Speed - The number of movement points this unit has for normal movement (flying for helos for example). ! MP is 1 hex on roads, but of road, this varies on terrain and move class. Off map planes use a speed number - where 9 is the start of jet noises.

Swim - Used for the number of hexes a unit can move over water.

EW - Electronic Warfare value. Mainly used for AA vs aircraft capability. For non flak on map units which are vehicles, the field is used for special countermeasures devices. A value of 1 in this case is 1 shot of Arena active anti ATGM countermeasures, 2 is 2. 3 is 1 shot of Visual and Infrared Screening Smoke (VIRSS) which ejects anti TI smoke, possibly linked to an IR Jammer as well. 4 is 2 VIRSS shots. This field changes colour and displays a note when VIRSS or Arena are valid.

Radio Code - the tens part of the number is the chance of the unit being given a radio (for forts, assume 'radio' can cover field telephone). The digits will be 0, 1, 2 or 3 never anything else (no "75" for example). A figure of say 2 could be used here - for example for an infantry unit which will never have a radio issued by the code (no tens part in its radio code) but is commonly picked by the AI ( a 2 in the digits part of its radio code).

The digits part is used by the AI in picking units as a rarity code. In particular - never use an X3 radio code if you do not understand AI unit and formation picks fully. 0 is normal chance of picking, 1 is rare (AI will tent to skip over this unit), 2 is common (AI will tend to stick on this unit as it runs through the list upwards).
3 - is explained in formations, but is not recommended unless you are an expert as odd things may happen with this code. It is however useful to exclude units from the AI pick, provided that you do not use this unit as the template unit in any formation!. (for example - tank X is available 1950 through 1970, but beyond 1960, you do not want the AI to pick it. Make 2 tank X units exactly the same. Run 1 from 1950 to 1960, with say an X0 radio code. Copy to paste buffer, paste in a successive slot. Change dates from 1961 to 1970, and change radio code to X3. Now, the AI as it trundles through the unit list, will be able to choose tank X in the early time frame, but will not choose it in the second time frame - but the human player can if he so desires. You could have the second tank X as a different class (say Obsolete MBT) - but that means the creation of another set of formations based on Obsolete MBT, and the human having to go off and pick such.
Never use a unit with an X3 radio code as the template unit in a formation unless you absolutely know what you are doing (see formations tab for more on template units and the X3 radio code effects).

Vision/TI/GSR - numbers over 0 are night fighting vision devices. Approximately 20 for most vehicle IR searchlights, 30 for Image Intensifiers or LLTV systems, Infantry systems tend to be in the 10 to 15 range. Values of 40 or more have the special ability to look through smoke - units with 40 plus vision have Thermal Imaging (TI) sights, ranges of 50 or so on represent Ground Surveillance Radars (GSR). Label changes and colour changes if TI vision is granted.

Icon - The actual game icon used for this unit. An icon list may be published by SP Camo. You cannot add game icons - these are stored in shape files, and the turret and hull associations are stored internally to the game code. External utilities such as SPILE which worked for SP2 etc. will not work as the icon array is much larger than before. (SP1 had 391 icons, there are about 3000 icon slots in SPWW2 as I write - maybe more by the time it gets out! :). There is a spin button - but going outside the allowed ranges may crash the game as there is no shape file relating to that number. 0 is the original SSI M1 Abrams, currently the max number is 2997. Mobhack does its best to show the unit icon in the bottom right of the form - but the game itself is the final arbiter as to actual colour etc.

Weapons
Each unit is allowed up to 4 weapons each in its own slot.
Slot 1 is the primary weapon and is likely to be available more often. Slot 1 is the only one which can be assigned HEAT or sabot rounds as well. (But for HEAT there is a work around - see 222 HEAT code later in weapon data).
In SP - weapons further down the list of 4 become less available as the unit gets damaged or is suppressed. Weapons down the list are less likely to fire (depending on skill etc.) - just because a 'shot' is detailed for a weapon, does not in SP men that it is guaranteed to fire on the 'F' key being pressed, if it is not weapon slot 1. Therefore - placement of weapons in slot order is important in unit design, more primary
In infantry teams - weapon slot 1 is for the primary infantry weapon. (Weapon class 1). In the code, class 1 weapons in slot number 1 get their fire strength and to-hit adjusted upwards as more men are added to the section. a unit with rifle only in slot 1 has several shots (internally in the code) - a section with rifles in slot 2 to 4 has but 1 shot. A rifle section with rifle in slot 1 and another slot therefore does not have 2 'rifle shots' - it has slot 1 times multiplier + 1 unmultiplied rifle shot.
It is perfectly OK for a support weapon infantry team to have another weapon type in slot 1 - say an LMG team of 4 men with LMG, rifle, others - in this case they would only get 1 unmultiplied rifle shot, which is OK as their prime task is servicing the gun. The LMG would tend to get more shot opportunities in a move as it is in the prime slot, or if the unit is suppressed or damaged etc.
NB - a 'shot' is not 1 round - think of each as an engagement - therefore a sniper can kill >1 man with 1 so-called 'shot' - in reality he would have expended several rounds.

Weapon number - relates to the weapon number on the weapons tab. Enter directly, or better, use the ellipses button to select the weapon directly.

HE - number of HE engagement opportunities this weapon has.

AP - Number of AP engagement opportunities for this weapon.

Sabot - Weapon Slot 1 only - Number of AP round number 2 (called sabot) engagement opportunities for this weapon

HEAT - Weapon Slot 1 only - Number of HEAT engagement opportunities this weapon has.

Sound - enter a sound byte code to override the default weapon class. Sound byte information is not public domain. Note also that weapon or unit class can override this sound, as can fire type (e.g. Indirect as opposed to direct).

Fire Control - This affects accuracy, especially against moving targets. Values over 99 are fire control radars, with 101 being better than 100. Field changes colour if AAA radar is issued. AAA radar is only worthwhile for AA units, obviously - SP SAM, AA guns, SP AA guns. SEAD aircraft seek out units with active AAA radar - there is no EMCON in SP. Anti-radar missiles may destroy the radar, if not the firer. (As a reference point, 5 was used as a maximum in WW2 data - e.g. king Tiger )

Range Finder - This makes hitting targets easier, especially for firers who did not move. 14 is the level for laser range finders, use 6 for the ranging coaxial rifle calibre MG as used in UK tanks, or 8 for a ranging .50 MG as used in Chieftains. Use around 6 to 10 for optical range finders as in the M48/M60/Leo 1. values under 5 tend to be used for WW2 type tank sights. For reference - 4 was generally the max value in SP 1 (e.g. panthers) barring some specials (e.g. 8 for the Nashorn, which used a stereo optical range finder of artillery observer type).

Stabiliser - this allows the unit to move and still keep a fire control solution (target lock) on its current target (if any) - and reduces the effects of own firer movement. Larger is better. Units with high FC and RF can engage slow moving helos with AP shot. (Almost anyone in range can shoot at hovering helos).

Armour

this is split into 3 types.

Steel armour is the basic armour (if any). For planes, the front steel armour value is the 'durability' of the airframe, and the side hull armour value is used for armoured planes like Sturmoviks and the A-10 etc.

Anti HEAT armour is either spaced or special armours which have extra resistance to shaped charge (HEAT). if ANY field is filled in here - then all fields must be so, even if these remain the same as the steel armour. The values must also be greater than the steel, or equal - never lower!. The top HEAT armour value is sometimes used for a strafer number for off map attack planes with rifle calibre mg - see above.

ERA - Explosive Reactive Armour, or active armour. Blocks of high explosives strewn over the vehicle which explode when a HEAT jet passes through them, hopefully disrupting the shaped charge jet. Comes in ordinary and Advanced forms - advanced ERA can defeat incoming AP rounds as well. Vehicles with ERA must not be given a carry capacity - distinctly unhealthy for troops to be sat on such a vehicle!. Higher numbers mean a greater chance to disrupt a HEAT round. Numbers from 1 to 10 on a facing are ordinary ERA. Numbers from 11 to 20 are Advanced ERA such as Soviet Kontakt. The field changes colour id advanced ERA is issued. Each ERA explosion, whether or not it defeats the incoming round, reduces the ERA number for that face. Once 0 is reached, or if the ERA fails, then the AP round will attack the underlying anti-HEAT or steel armour as normal. Multi charge ATGM have a higher chance of defeating ERA than plain vanilla HEAT. Note that cluster bomblets are considered HEAT rounds for ERA.

Each digit, other than for ERA, is very approximately 1 centimetre of thickness at normal. (SP adds to this value for glancing shots - a side shot impacting at 30 degrees off 0 degrees will have to penetrate more than the number entered for that side armour).

ROF - rate Of Fire - this affects weapons larger than size 2 (infantry weapons) in the main. Usually in the 6 to 9 value - can be say 40 for an off map Multiple Launch Rocket.

Smoke Dischargers - the number of smoke discharger salvos this unit has.

Oft asked question - 'How do I add N smoke rounds to my unit, like I can in the Scenario Editor?' - the answer is that the number of smoke rounds given out to a unit is determined in the unit creation code in the game code, based on the unit class and weapon size, as well as battle type (more smoke ammo tends to be given to the assaulter). There is no data field for smoke rounds - the field you edit in the Scenario Editor is in game data (like the leader name) , not OB data.

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Weapons Tab

Each OB has its own set of up to 255 weapons - there is no central database of weapons, so keeping all these in synch across up to 99 OB files is a complete pain, especially if the name of the weapon changes!.

If you need a weapon, it is best to copy it from an existing SP Camo OB item, before trying any editing.

Weapon Name - 15 character maximum, no non-ASCII codes such as umlauts etc. or the game will crash.

Weapon class - An absolutely vital field, which is the basic weapon behaviours. Flame weapons make flame effects, SAMS fire at aircraft, and missiles use missile launch sequences etc. Some notes.

Class 1 - This is the infantry primary weapon class. This covers Rifles, SMG and so forth. Infantry units with a class 1 weapon in weapon slot will have their fire effect adjusted for the number of men in the unit and range in hexes, less bonus at long range. This reflects the number of riflemen in the section. Inf Prime weapons not in slot 1 do not get this bonus.
Class 4 - FLAK - if under size 2, is assumed to be external AAMG - so if the vehicle is closed down (=American 'buttoned') then these weapons will not be able to fire. Size 2 (20mm etc) and above are assumed to be on AA mounts and do not have this problem.
Class 10 - use only for naval artillery which only the assaulter in a beach game will be allowed for naval gunfire support. Class 10 weapons will only be seen by the player who has to do the beach landing assault. (This is how the code splits naval guns from normal off map artillery).
Class 11 - this is used for off map aircraft weapons. (Not helicopter MG or so on). These can be cannon or rockets, or if range is 1 hex, bombs.

Class 11 Aircraft weapons must only be allocated to strike, bomber or wild weasel planes, not to on map units.

Class 11 air weapons if auto cannon or MG will use the HE ammo number for number of engagement opportunities, and the AP byte is then used to represent the number of cannons/MGs for this type of class 11 weapon. Helicopters use normal on-map MG or cannon classes, not class 11. You may therefore need a copy of say a 12.7 gatling - one off map for fixed wing planes and one on map, with normal AP ammo and possibly sabot for your helicopters to use.

Class 11 air cannon can only use HE ammo as the AP round number is used as the number of cannon, so if they have an armour piercing capability then this is reflected in an HE AP rating, not an AP round rating. Class 11 air cannon are fired at 2 standard ranges - about 8-10 and 2 or 3 hexes, so max range is not very relevant - leave at about 20 hexes should do. (As they use HE AP values there is no pull down for range between firer and target in any case).

Other class 11 weapons - bombs, missiles etc - use the HE rounds as number of bombs. Do not allocate them an AP rounds number as they are not air cannon, so not multiplied by the AP 'number of cannon' multiplier.

Spotter, glider and transport planes do not use weapons.

Bombers can only drop bombs - weapons with range of 1 hex, therefore cannot use cannon, stand off weapons or guns/cannons.

Aircraft passes are determined by remaining 20mm plus cannon ammo if no other weapons are left - size 2 and above. Therefore - for WW2 in the main - where strafing planes with 0.50 or rifle calibre mg were needed - these are controlled by the strafe number - this is entered in the HEAT Top Armour byte, for fighter bomber or SEAD planes only. If entered an S:NN is displayed beside the plane's name on the buy screen. It can be used on planes with a 20mm plus cannon to reduce passes, but in this case - better to reduce the number of actual shots, if you do not want the plane to linger for strafing runs after offloading its heavier ordnance.

Class 14 - only use for HE ammo, for MRL or air dropped cluster bombs. Can have AP value, but only issue HE rounds of this type to your units whether strike plane or on map MRL. Usually named as "weapon name - CM" for Cluster Munition as a reminder to players.
Class 15 - Off map minelet batteries should only be used for this type, of the 2 dedicated types (rocket or tube) - minelets should never be issued to on map units or aircraft. (I may have safety code implemented in the game code if not in V1, certainly by V2, to restrict minelets to the 2 dedicated off map battery types). Minelet units should only have 4 to 6 rounds and all ammo must be of type 'HE' - this ensures the cluster button is used on the bombard screen. Minelet units can only throw minelets, they cannot have say HE shells and some mine rounds like arty can have some normal HE as well as bomblets. Note that In American military speak, minelets are called FASCAM.
Class 16 - ARM will automatically target any active enemy AAA radar on map. If none or all have been damaged by ARM - these are unable to fire.
Class 17 - these are for large air missiles, and as all aircraft weapons must be HE types, need a large HE AP value - if there is an off map air version of say an ATGM - you must make a class 17 version with large HE kill for the off map planes, as you cannot hang the on map version under a plane's wings.
Class 18 - Napalm - is used for air napalm bombs (range 1) - but are also used as ranged flame weapons for on map units (FAE weapons for example like the buratino or RPO launcher).
Class 19 - Auto Cannon - this operates exactly like any other auto cannon, but it has limited AAA capabilities against lower flying planes and helicopters. Thus, this reflects the mounting, rather than the weapon - it is possible to have say 2 14.5mm or 20mm cannon with the same stats, but one will be class 19, the other typically class 5. The difference here is that the class 19 version represents a high angle high traverse rate type mounting, but the class 5 version would be in a low elevation, low traverse turret mainly intended for anti APC work.
Class 20 - Top Attack ATGM - is exactly the same as class 13, but it generates many more top attack hits due to its flyover trajectory. It also is considered a class 21 missile for anti ERA purposes.
Class 21 - Multi Charge ATGM - Modern missile with 2 or more sub charges designed to strip away ERA, or a 'dibber' or similar device. Performs better against ERA protected units than class 13.

Accuracy - this number increases the ability of the weapon to hit compared with the same stats used but with a lower Accuracy number. look at existing weapons to see how this number is used. (See the sniper rifle for example and contrast with say a normal bolt action rifle).

Weapon Size - this variable is used chiefly when reloading from ammo dumps etc, though warhead size is used as well. larger numbers load more slowly. Never zero.

Warhead Size - this is a very important variable. Larger WH size represents larger shells. WH over a certain value will cause crater damage, drop bridges (higher yet to drop stone ones) and cause larger explosion graphics and noises etc. None, some or all of Warhead Size can be added to all kill and penetration values, so if all stats are identical - an AP shell with a larger WH will tend to penetrate more armour at a given range than the exact same stats, bar WH size. An HE weapon with larger WH size will kill a few more men on average than a weapon with identical HE characteristics, bar WH size. Size 0 could be allowable for militarily useless weapons like pistols, for example, to reduce their effect dramatically from other HE kill 1 weapons - but not recommended.

HE Penetration - This is used when an HE round hits or explodes in the same hex as an armoured target. It does not degrade with range, unlike solid shot AP. Since it has an effect on all targets in a hex, it is not useful to make a proper HESH (American 'HEP') type shell by assigning a large HE AP value to a normal HE round. Otherwise, you get a super shell which wipes out 2 or 3 BMP in a single hex!.

HE Kill - the value of the round at killing soft targets. Bigger is better!.

AP Penetration - The value of armour the normal AP shot can penetrate at the muzzle. Special code 222 - the 'HEAT code' - can be used here for weapons which have HEAT ammo, never ever have AP ammo, but require to be deployable in weapon slots other than slot 1. Therefore - 222 code will be seen in recoilless rifles, ATGM, and infantry AT type weapons. If the code finds 222 as an AP value - it uses the HEAT value instead.

AP Kill - this value is used for cluster type munitions as an HE kill value.

Sabot Penetration - The AP value at the muzzle for the second AP type round, if issued. 'Sabot' is just a name - the normal AP round can of course be an APDS or APFSDS round, with the sabot round perhaps representing a more advanced round - e.g. a DU APFSDS. Sabot is also used for Armour Piercing Composite Rigid (APCR) - Known to American speakers as HVAP - or 'arrow' shot, of late WW2 vintage. These are basically similar to sabot rounds, but do not discard the sabot at the muzzle, so suffer from increased drag, somewhat like a ping pong ball with a steel core - they lose velocity and hence AP value rather quickly, but at close ranges are better than the plain AP shot.

Sabot Range - This range is used for the second AP round, and hence can differ. (All other ammo uses the Weapon range). An APCR round will tend to have a higher AP value than the plain AP round, but a shorter Sabot range than Weapon range. This shows the high penetration at the muzzle, but the shorter max range draws down the AP value quicker as range increases so its AP value will fall below the AP round at not too great a range. Where the second AP round is being used for an actual APDS type round (where the sabot is discarded at the muzzle, thus the only drag is from the sub calibre penetrator, not the penetrator plus the light metal shroud as in APCR), then the sabot range will be longer than the Weapon Range, or the AP value greater, or both. (If the sabot round has the same AP value as the AP shot, but longer range, the draw down for range will be less for that round at any range X as opposed to the shorter ranged AP shot, so the longer ranged sabot round will penetrate more armour at any given range X). (The draw down decrement for range is roughly linear.)

HEAT penetration - The armour value the HEAT shaped charge can cut through at any range, at normal impact. HEAT only weapons should use the 222 AP code outlined above, so the AP ammo becomes HEAT in weapon slots 2 through 4.

Weapon Range - The maximum range in hexes the weapon can fire all rounds to except for the 'sabot' round, if the range is in the 1 to 199 range. Ranges of 200 and greater are used as an abstraction for range for off map artillery and stand off missiles, and for on map long range SAM firing at off map planes. In this case, 200 means 'indirect' and 201 can shoot further than a 200. A range 203 gun can counterbattery guns of ranges 200 to 202, and sometimes an enemy battery with range 203, but not an enemy battery with range 204. Do not assign off map batteries weapons with ranges less than 200 hexes, or you will find some areas of the map (not necessarily on the side your opponent is on) are out of range.

Some weapons editing points:
Weapon effect, fire graphic, impact graphic, sound played, causation of shell holes, effects on bridges and so forth is a complex interaction of weapon class, HE Kill, and Warhead Size. Adding 1 HE kill point may make a weapon fire MG tracer, or make a different sound, or use the cannon explosion graphic etc. Experiment if necessary. Unit Class can also override weapon sounds (LCS are only to be armed with rockets so make a rocket swoosh in indirect fires, built in), as can mode of fire - indirect and direct can differ. There is no 'table' for me to give you even though I have the source code - even I need to experiment sometimes when unexpected side effects happen.
Artillery Bomblets
Artillery bomblets in SP2 (which SPMBT is based on) are AP rounds. Therefore - on map howitzers and so forth cannot be issued with an AP round, as that is the bomblet munition type. Look at existing bomblet artillery weapons for guidance - they have AP kill, and .AP penetration. Some MRL use class 14 with HE ammo rather than AP - so the rounds appear on the HE menu, not using the cluster button on the bombardment screen - in this case adding 'CM' to the name of the weapon is a good idea.
Artillery minelets
These are powerful items in this game. In real life, a battalion of howitzers (c. 18 guns) require to shoot for at least a half hour to provide a useful minefield about 500 metres wide with minelet ammunition. SP allows remote minefields to be laid rather too quickly, so the amount of such ammunition should be severely restricted, to about 4 or 5 shots. Minelet ammo must also always be AP type. Only the 2 off map artillery minelet classes should be used to allow minelet delivery.
Weapons data and scenarios
Changing weapons slot data can completely trash existing saved games and especially scenarios. Scenarios store weapons ID numbers, not the raw data at the point of scenario manufacture. Therefore, changing weapon 123 to 5.5 inch field gun, from say 7.62mm CMG - will result in co axial 5.5 inch guns on many tanks in scenarios which had used weapon slot 123 (including user campaigns, which are a set of scenarios). The scenarios will also keep the ammunition issued by the designer - so removing say sabot ammo from a weapon will probably result in units in the scenarios with useless sabot ammo. Basically - never change a weapon slot's type, use a blank weapons slot. At a pinch - use a weapon slot not utilised in any unit in the units list for this nation (check every unit before doing so - you may just find some unexpected unit in say the UK OOB using say USA M1 rifles!).
Indirect Capability
Indirect capability in SP comes from unit class, not the weapon class. Thus to fire indirect, you require to be an on or off map artillery or mortar class unit.

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Formations Tab

Formation editing causes the most problems in OOB editing.

A formation is a list of 1 to 10 unit templates or formation pointers.

A unit template is one of the things on the units page, funnily enough!. A unit's number from the units page is entered as the template unit for that slot in the formation. The first slot in any formation must be a unit, slots 2 to 9 may be formation pointers in company type formations.

It is important to realise that the unit placed in a formation is a template, not necessarily a representation of that specific unit. The formation pick code will use the Unit Class of the unit placed as a template as its search key when replacing that template with possible units of the exact same class available at that specific battle date. More specifics about template units will be mentioned later.

A formation pointer is a special code pointing to a subordinate platoon entered instead of a unit number. It is made up of 1000 plus the formation's ID number on this formations tab. So formation 123 would be entered as 1123. On purchase, this will be expanded to include the units from a formation of that type inside the company, under a separate leader.

There are 2 types of formation in SP - companies and platoons.

Platoons

A platoon is a formation whose organisation is flat - i.e. there are no sub formations (formation pointers) contained within its list, just single template units.

There are 2 platoon type formations - Type code 1 is the normal platoon, and tends to get a Lt or occasionally a 2 Lt assigned as its commander (air sections will tend to have a 2 Lt), with any other units being assigned sergeant as leaders. Type code 0 is also a platoon, but is retitled as 'section' in the formation editor. A class 0 section type platoon will get a sergeant in command - it is meant for sections of 1 to 3 support weapons, trucks or what have you not requiring an officer, conscript rifle platoons and so forth. Remember that as far as the game code is concerned - both these are platoons, and will show 'P' in the HQ menu, and they can be cross attached under the command of company HQ units. Off map naval artillery batteries are a rarely seen third platoon type.

Companies

A company is the same as a platoon, with the difference that instead of being a flat organisation, it can contain nested sub formations - which must be platoon types (section or platoon, 0 or 1 command level). When the purchasing code finds a formation pointer inside a company, it buys a new formation based on that platoon template, and places it under command of the company commander. Nesting is only allowed to 1 level (platoon types under a company type). There are several company types.

Command level 2 is the normal SP company - it is commanded by a captain, occasionally a major.

Command level 3 is new for SPMBT. It is called an independent platoon for now. It will be commanded by a Lt rather than a captain, and that is the only difference between it and a class 2 company. Despite the name - as far as game code is concerned it is a company. Therefore it cannot be placed under command of any other company type. Its main use is for conscript rifle companies and for use for some larger recce companies such as perhaps USA Armor cavalry which may not fit into the 10 unit max of a normal platoon, or which by training will operate with its various sections widely separated over the battlefield.

Command level 5 is the Battle Group HQ. Only one of these is allowed in an OOB, and it must be the first formation. The Battle Group HQ is led by a Lt Colonel, no matter the force size under his command. Although it is a company, and you could assign sub units and formation templates to it, this is strongly not recommended, as the code will buy the HQ units as an AI purchase with no chance for the end user to select the individual types!. Therefore the BGHQ should only consist of an HQ unit type template. Even attaching say a jeep as slot 2 will cause wails if there are several units of that class available - sometimes it may buy say a Spartan rather than a Land Rover and the user wanted the LR, with no way to change this he will be annoyed. Since SPMBT allows cross attachment it is best to leave the BGHQ with just the HQ to be A0, and those users who want to add lift to the A0 can buy a single vehicle section from the 'misc' page and cross attach it under A0 (it will be by default in most cases anyhow) at turn 1.

Unit Commander

The unit in slot 1 of a formation will be assigned as the commander - in campaign games, if he is killed, this may change.

The LBM shown for the formation on the purchase page will be the LBM of this first unit - So a mortar platoon should be all mortars, not a rifle section and then some mortars, or the user will se a rifle section picture, not the expected picture of a mortar. Stick any such at the end of the list!.

The listing order for formations on each buy page is based on the unit class of the first unit in the formation. Therefore if you have 1 mortar platoon with a rifle section as number 1, as well as showing the wrong type of picture - it will be sorted with any other items having a unit of that class as unit 1 on the listing, and probably not with the other mortar units, assuming you have another mortar class with say mortars in slot 1.

When the AI deploys units on the map, it determines the entire unit type from the unit in slot 1. So if you have an MBT platoon with a scout section in slot 1 for some weird reason - the AI placement will be as for an infantry type.

So - unless you have any special reason for not doing so, the first unit in the formation must be of the main formation type - an MBT for an MBT platoon, a rifle section for a rifle platoon, an ATGM for an ATGM formation etc.

Fields
Formation Name - 15 characters maximum, USA ASCII only.
Nation - This OOB's nation, unless this is an unused or AI only formation
Available From - First month and year this formation can be bought
Available to - Last month and year this formation can be bought.
Purchase Screen - The particular purchase page in the game that this formation will be made available to purchase on.

0 - Default - Game code determines which page from whatever is in unit slot 1.

1 - Armour through 4 Misc - your formation will appear on that selected page, overriding code default - best to override default really to avoid unexpected things!.

10 - Only used for the BGHQ. It is auto bought.

5 - Air Transport+Troops. A special 'page' for mixed units of troops with air transport bought for them as part of the formation - transport helos, para transport planes or gliders. This code ensures that these formations are only offered if the user has 1 or more air strikes remaining, and do not appear if no strikes allocated or left. All mixed air transport and passenger type formations must be of this purchase screen type.

Formation Type - The formation type code as outlined above - 0 for a section etc.
Unit 1 - The first slot must be a unit, never a formation. It is the commander of the formation.
Unit/Formation N - Slots 2 to 9 may be units or formations as outlined above. The ellipses button if clicked will bring up the unit picker, if left clicked and legal (this is a company type formation and not a platoon type) - it will bring up the formations picker. Note that for MBT Mobhack - the formations picker will mark illegal formations. Illegal formations would be assigning another company type formation under a company - and recall that a type 3 company (independent platoon') is in game terms a company so it cannot be assigned under another company formation. Type 3 company independent platoons are stand alone formations, just like any other company type.
Experience and Morale modifiers - leave at 0 and the formation (and any sub formation) units when bought will use the default experience and morale and hence costs (depending on whether national characteristics is on or off in the game preferences). Otherwise - positive numbers increase experience (training) levels and cost, while negative numbers will reduce these, and purchase cost.

Template Units

As stated above - the unit you place in a formation slot is a template unit. It stands for any legal unit in the unit list of that unit class, available at the date the formation is purchased. Thus - place a light infantry unit here, and all the light infantry types in the OOB for that date and time are made available to the human player to select on purchase. Place an MBT - all the current MBT are made selectable.

The first rule of formation design is that there shall be no 'gaps' in formations. Say you have an armoured car section available from 1946 to 2020, but in the OOB you have 2 armoured cars - A is available from 46 to 80, B is available from 85 to 2020. From 1981 to 84 - you have a gap which will confuse end users! - above al, it may confuse the AI pick (see later for AI pick notes). If this formation is human only - then either close the gap by extending one of the units dates, or create 2 formations, 1 for the first period, the second for the second.

Be especially careful when editing companies to ensure their platoons are available throughout the entire period of the company formation. However - if arranged in a crafty manner - you can get away with having platoons under companies that exist only at the end of the company time frame - by ensuring that the part time platoons are at the end of the list, and in last start date order.

So - you have a rifle co with 3 rifle platoons, available 1946 to 2020 say, but it has a mortar section from 1966 to 2020, and an ATGM section added from 1980. Lay the company out as CHQ units, 3 rifle platoon pointers, then the mortar platoon pointer and finally as it appears last - the ATGM section pointer. Test thoroughly by buying at various dates, as this is not 100% guaranteed.

NB - I added new code to the SPMBT purchase code to check on the availability of subordinate formations (The SP2 code did not do this and would sometimes buy inappropriately) - the above careful layout may not be necessary any more.

This layout does apply to platoons though - if a unit cannot be found at a particular date, sometimes strange things will happen (especially if the unit had an X3 radio code!). The usual thing that happens, barring X3 - is a gap in the platoon - this will cause a break in the formation, and a new platoon is created with the units after the gap especially if buying the platoon as part of a company formation. Therefore - say you have a mech inf platoon of 3 rifle units, 3 APC and an infantry SAM, but the SAM is only available at the start of that formations 'era'. Place the SAM at the end of the list (after the APC) and its disappearance in early part of the formation's era will not cause a hiccup. Note that this does not always work in reverse - if something is only available for the first part of the formation era - you will probably need 2 formations. As with all such exploits - test your formation by buying it at all dates through its era, and also - test buying it as part of a company formation at all dates through its era.

The above are advanced techniques for experienced OOB designers - if you are a novice, or want to be 100% sure - make separate formations for each (Rifle co A with no mortars, then Rifle Co B with them, and finally Rifle Co C with mortars and ATGM).

With the new MBT platoon cross attachment code, mixed formations are at first blush less useful to OOB designers - however, they are most useful for the AI pick, and also for human end users as they can buy a ready-rolled Company combat team without having to mess about in turn 1 attaching things about.

It is normal as well to use the first unit of a particular class as the template, and to lay out your OOB units of a class in a linear date oriented fashion. This is because when the code starts a pick, it will start its search from the unit you specifies offset in the OOB, and then move forwards testing each such unit it finds, as and until it actually finds one it likes and stops there. If the pick code reaches the end of the OOB file - it does not always loop round and go from the OOB start to the initial pick position. It tends to like the unit you use as the template, if it is in period at the pick, but units before the one you point at in the OOB will tend to be picked less often as it is not guaranteed to loop around on reaching OOB end. Intelligent picking of the correct unit as a template can have a drastic effect on the AI force buy, as can say, jumbling units up by date - if say you have your OOB laid out - most early tank, 2020 wonder monster tank, then the in betweenies and use most early tank as the template - because the AI pick code tends to move on, when the 2020 wonder monster is current, it will often whiz by it, and pick some other intermediate dated tank from the in betweeny dates that is still current. For most OOBS - lay units of a class out in increasing date (and perhaps cost) order in the OOB.

The X3 Radio Code.

And why not to use it (much)!.

The early SSI SP code only allowed a limited number of unit classes - about 40 of these. There was one scout car and one armoured car class for example. The X3 radio radio code seems to have been designed to ensure that certain things were the only ones picked in a particular formation

. E.g. say one wanted a formation of 4 light tanks, a UK one with always 2 Scorpion and 2 scimitar - both light tanks in the old style OOB. The solution was to give both these light tanks an X3 radio code. The X3 radio code means "buy this specific unit if used as a template unit in a formation", but it is subject to severe limitations. If the formation the unit is used as the template exists beyond the dates the X3 template unit actually exists, strange things happen, especially when the AI buys such a formation. Usually - the formation will appear with an outdated or future unit at the wrong date. When presented to the human for purchase, often the out of era unit with the X3 radio code is presented on the buy screen on initial load of the formation but is not shown as a choice. The other problem with this method is that selecting one of the light tanks offered as choices in the purchase screen would replace all 4 units, as they were all light tank class.

The expanded class types of SPWW2, and now SPMBT were designed to get OOB designers round the problems of such mixed formations and the limitations of the X3 radio code when you want specific units in specific formations. Now as an OOB designer, all you need do is define your scorpions as 1 unit class and the scimitars as another, so you now have a formation of 2 light tanks of class A, and 2 of class B therefore the formation will now always be 2 of one and 2 of the other class of vehicle.

You may need to duplicate some of your units but with differing unit classes - for example if you have a mixed troop (2 scorpion 2 scimitar) and want a pure troop as well (4 scorpion or 4 scimitar). Either copy one of them and only change its unit class - or build a mixed formation, a pure scorpion formation and a pure scimitar formation. Which way you go (duplicates with different class or several formations) - is up to you, and perhaps determined by other considerations such as parent formations and AI pick list.

Use classes to split mixed formations now - so the X3 radio code is obsolete. Or is it?.

There is one legitimate use for the X3 radio code, as its corollary effect is - if a unit has an X3 radio code and it is not used as a template unit then it will not be picked by the AI for a formation using that unit class, ever. The X3 radio code is therefore useful for restricting some units to human only purchase - obsolete tanks say - without having to move them into a separate formation with another Unit Class. So - make tank A, and use if from dates X to Y - with normal radio code, and then copy it, paste it and extend the dates from Y to Z - but with an X3 radio code. AI pick will not now buy it, but those humans who want to, can.

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General Editing Notes & Rules

Special rules for planes and helos etc:

Do NOT mix strike aircraft, attack helos or bombers or spotters into any other formation. These units must be in pure formations of platoon type which only contain the one type. Additionally - the game code deducts one strike point for each such formation bought. In SP an air strike is 2 or rarely 3 strike planes or wild weasels or attack helos. Bombers may be in flights of 4. Spotters are in 1 or 2 packs. (UAV flights may be say 4).

SP deducts 1 strike point from the total allocated per such formation bought. It is OK to make formations with 1 plane or attack helo - end users sometimes find these useful where they may want to buy 1 plane at the end of purchase, but leave some points still unused for some other things like maybe a sniper or scout team etc.

You may think it is cool to make a strike with 10 planes - do not do this as the game balance (setting up of number of strikes for both sides) will be totally destroyed - if you PBEM somebody and allocate 2 strikes each, you expect him to have maybe 4 or 6 attack planes or so. You would be somewhat annoyed if he turned out to have 20 strike planes because you broke the design of the game's air strike allocation method.

Again - the code makes the decision on the unit in slot 1 being an aircraft of the requisite type. Therefore - say you want to make a USA mixed helo platoon type - say 2 attack helos and a scout light helo - put the 2 attack helos first, and the scout after, and the game will then correctly deduct 1 strike point for the attack helo part of this mixed element. Don't do it the other way round, or you grant the opponent infinite attack helos if he is granted any air strikes at all.

Singletons

if building a company type formation, placing single units after a formation pointer will cause these to be attached to the formation pointed to. Thus a company with mortar,mortar,truck,truck,mortar section,truck,truck (assuming the mortar section is 2 mortars with no transport) - would result in a bought company of CHQ - 2 mortars with trucks, and a subordinate mortar section of 2 tubes (from the platoon type pointed to) with 2 trucks added to that - the 2 singleton trucks listed immediately after the pointer go under the platoon, not under CHQ. Such singletons can cause problems though if the formation pointer they are placed under does not exist for some point in the formation era, but the singleton unit does (in this case trucks) - here it is better to make a new mortar section/T with 2 mortars and 2 trucks. Use of singletons can be a useful technique for experienced OOB designers, but maybe not the novice.

A singleton in a platoon formation which is NOT available right through the entire availability of the formation is best placed at the end, as otherwise it can throw "line breaks" in the formation.

Example:

Hypothetical mech platoon (assume the SAM team will load into an APC together with one of the rifle sections below and is available only later on, say in tha last year of 3 the platoon is made available)

Rifle section, rifle section 2, SAM team, APC1, APC2

Wrong! - this will produce a mech platoon of 2 rifle sections and a sub formation of 2 APC with no title in the early period when the SAM is not available as the "gap" SAM throws a formation break in the middle of the platoon. This uses up the limited number of formations when there is no need so to do!.

Restructure your mech platoon as: Rifle section, second rifle section, APC 1, APC2 and then the short-timer SAM at the end as the gap is then caused at formation end where it has no effect.

Bunkeritis

If you have a formation with a unit number that points at a blank unit slot (usually caused by reorganising your units) - then a formation of this type will when bought, buy a bunker (usually) for the blank slot. This phenomenon got called bunkeritis for this reason - for MBT, we have a new coloured MBT graphic that should show up in this case. The same often happens if you move a platoon - check all the companies for a formation pointing at thin air!. (moving a company type formation is not usually a problem).

Crew type

Do not move certain critical units - the crew is one such. Crew should only ever have pistols and maybe a grenade, they are meant to be spawned from disabled vehicles. There will be only 1 crew, exactly the same from 46 to 2020. Bunkers spit the same crew - no excuse to have extra crew with rifles say - as tanks will generate these. Crews always have point cost 0 - you get the VP for killing their bunker or vehicle, killing the crew is only useful for an extra kill marker, and making the cost non zero can result in strange arithmetic on the end game results - essentially if you made a crew with 10 points and they bailed out of a 200 point vehicle (paid for out of points) and you then killed them - you get credited with 210 points killed, when your opponent only spent 200. You could then wipe out the enemy force, and end up with more kill VP than that force cost!.

Do not move the barges or barge carrier. Do not move the rubber raft. These get assigned internally in the code (barge to carrier, raft to riflemen) in river or beach assault battles by direct ID number.

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The AI Pick List

A common thing for new OOB designers is to produce an OOB that looks wonderful when a human uses it to buy his forces.

Then, somebody assigns this nation as the AI opponent in a game, and the designer suddenly gets complaints of facing hordes of barge carriers, trucks or the AI force is completely made up of off map batteries some other weirdness.

The AI uses an internal list of formation numbers which it buys depending on Nationality, Date, available points, number of air strikes allocated, number of buy points currently remaining, random dice rolls, and sometimes who the enemy opponent is, plus whether or not the end user has set up the tank heavy flag etc. This is called the AI Pick List. The pick list information is not publicly published information.

Note that the AI pick code works on absolute formation numbers, and not formation 'types' - it does not look for a 'leg rifle company' - it looks for formation number 6.

The pick list is different for most OOBS - some minors use a generic pick. It is subject to change when the MBT exe changes as well.

The only way to figure out the pick list for a nation (without access to the source code) is to start up several hundred games at various points levels and of all battle types (Beach assault and defence, river assault and defence etc etc) with the computer buys forces button set, and examine what was bought in each case, noting patterns. Fight various different opponents as well - for example the Soviet buy versus say Chechnya is rather different than against a NATO country. Repeat this process at about 5 year differences from 1946 to 2020 (if your OOB lasts the entire period).

Why bother with the pick list? - well, if your OOB is only ever to be used by you, fine - but should you actually want to release it for others to use, it has to be AI buy compatible, because even if you specify human only usage - somebody will try to use it as an AI opponent!.

The easy way to ensure you have no AI pick problems is to follow the following rules.

1) Never remove an existing formation as the AI may well use it

2) Never alter the core dates of an existing SP Camo OOB formation - by all means, extend it back or forward, but never shrink the time band it is available for.

3) If you are going to alter a formation - ensure it remains exactly the same type. If it is a leg rifle platoon - it must remain a leg rifle platoon sort of formation, do not overwrite it with say a light tank platoon. Or it may be that the AI (as it does when points are low) - will be set up to buy that particular leg rifle platoon as a filler in that case. So - alter the configuration of the leg rifle platoon (you are convinced the Omnians had 4 rifle squads and a sniper in the leg platoon, not the 3 rifle squads the original designer used - fine, do that - but now look for any company formations using that leg rifle platoon - maybe a truck co with a 3 truck section per such platoon - ah, need a 4 truck section now!). If the formation is a company - rearrange its structure if desired, but keep it the same type. Do not replace the standard leg rifle company with your Omnian elite flamethrower guards company, unless you want to see rather a lot of flamethrower users when playing the AI!.

4) never change the formation type of an existing formation - if it is a platoon type, leave it as a platoon type, if a company - leave as a company. The AI pick is set up to buy companies when remaining buy points are high, platoons when it gets to the small change, for infantry and tanks. Reversing that is not a good idea.

5) Certain key formations - forts, leg engineer platoon, strike and attack helos, transport helos (sometimes the AI will air assault), barge carriers, artillery (especially naval arty which has peculiar layout rules for its formations) should never be messed with. (By all means - say you think the Omnians should have a few extra engineers in a river crossing - add a couple of such to the default barge carrier formation, and then make a pure barge carrier for human consumption using another formation slot). These ones must always be platoons, or results can be undefined.

6) You may find some AI formations in the OOB - often these have // added to the name, and they usually have the 'wrong' nationality - treat exactly like an existing SP Camo formation, however - you now know that yo have an AI only formation the human will not be able to buy. (Such formations can be useful for the designer - for example WW2 USA mechanised infantry companies were a mix of all sort so of things the AI would not properly handle - it would leave the AT guns on the start line and charge the jeeps forwards, the mortars and so on. Simplified AI only formations were needed).

7) OK - be careful with any existing SP Camo formation - adjust a bit within reason, but not greatly. The best thing to do - especially if the OOB you are designing is aimed at other human players- is to utilise only empty formation slots for your supplementary new stuff. Use only free unit slots for your new units, and use only empty weapon slots for your new weapons (remember that existing scenarios and campaigns are very sensitive to careless weapon database edits).

Unless you want to edit the AI pick list data files, do not move any SP Camo formation to another slot, nor should you increase its start date or reduce its end date as a formation must be available at the date of the battle or the pick code will reject it - modifying the availability date or worse yet moving the formation away from its slot will result in very strange AI picks - for example with no infantry being chosen!.

SPMBT, unlike SPWW2 which needs dedicated code-based AI pick list handling for specific WW2 historical reasons, uses a data driven AI pick list. These are reasonably flexible text based data files, and they reside in the data/misc folder of the game. Do not try to manually edit or otherwise alter the AI pick files!.

The AI pick files for all nations are availabe in a zip file with instructions at the MBT page on the SP Camo site - Note that the main workspace file for each pick is a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet, so you will nead Excel, or another spreadsheet capable of importing Excel format files. There is no user friendly editor, nor will there ever be one provided - it is a case of preparing columns of the correct format and copy/paste into the appropriate text data files.

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The Database Check Utilities

These were written to help me QA the WW2 and especially MBT files with 90 or so nations!.

They are not guaranteed to be cuddly and user friendly.

Note that if you open a new OOB while the form is open you will not get an auto update - just tab to another page and back and it will refresh.

Also note the resize grip in the bottom right of the status panel - this means you can resize the form, some playtesters did not realise this and complined about the small size of the for <G>.

Use the up and down arrows when the focus is in a list on the LHS pane to go up and down 1 item at a time quickly.

 

Formation Checks Tab

Check Unit Class Tab

Select a unit class, and all formations using that unit class are listed in the RHS window

Broken Links Tab

Press the run button to check. Any formations not of the current nation ID are listed as possible problems (nation 0 ones are often AI formations or otherwise hidden from the user so are not necessarily errors). Any link in a formation pointing to "air" instead of a unit or formation are listed. Useful if you deleted or moved a template unit!.

Template Unit Finder Tab

This tab shows all the units in the LHS window, and if used as a template, they are so denoted. Selecting the unit shows which formations it is so used in.

Platoon Finder Tab

This tab shows all the platoon level formations (and sections) in the LHS, any non such are marked "invalids". Selecting a platoon shows which company type formations, if any, use the particular platoon in the RHS window.

Company Finder Tab

This shows all company type formations in the LHS panel. Selecting a company shows its structure in the RHS panel - all template units at CHQ, and platoons etc.

X3 Dates Check Tab

If a template unit has an X3 radio code, it is the only valid choice in that slot. it should therefore be available for 100% of the formation's availability date or nasty things will happen especially for AI picks (Humans can choose an alternate at buy time AI cannot). Any suspect template units with X3 radio codes are listed on pressing the run button.

Unit Checks Tab

Find Units Tab

All unit classes are listed on the LHS. Select a unit class and all such units in the units database are listed in the RHS window, with availability dates - useful for checking for gaps in coverage!.

Find Foreign Units Tab

Any units found which are not of this OOBs nationality are listed.

Weapons Check Tab

Find Weapon Users Tab

All weapons are listed in the LHS window. Selecting a weapon shows which units use the weapon, and in which slot number.

Weapons By Class Tab

All weapons classes listed in LHS. Select weapon class and you get a listing of all weapons in the weapons database of that weapon class.

Scratchpad Tab

This tab is used to print out reports from the other tabs, or to build up your own to-do list for OOB work or whatever you fancy.

It is a mini text editor.

The grey tabs in the database check form are all Delphi TMemo components - you can select the text and copy to the paste buffer (right click for action list).

Once selected, you can paste in here (or your own external editor if so desired) and manipulate as desired.

Load - load a text fie into the editor window.

Save - save current text to a file.

Print - Printer dialogue.

Font Button - change printer font via a font dialogue box.