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[WxTech]

I guess then that code would need to be added in AircraftState.class to assign an effect for oil damage based on engine type. Would be easy to do if I could get some value that's assigned for engine type. Think I'll look into it.

So, Mick. Not being a motorhead myself, what deteines the color of this smoke from differing engine/oil/cooler systems? Are all such emissions actual smoke, or are some uncombusted fluids? Representing fluids would involve a rather different look than for smoke.

[WxTech]

For the time being, given that we have only one oil damage smoke effect, I feel that having it differ in appearance from other damage smokes is worthwhile. Effects that have a too-similar look is kind of boring. and at least the fact that some oil system damage produces a whitish smoke lends credence to my current notion.

Now, I've made the first damage smokes for engine and fuel tank a fairly light hue, which don't differ too much in tone from my oil smoke. Perhaps I might wish to tweak those, making them a tad darker.

I welcome all your thoughts on the matter.

[baggo]

WxTech,really pleased with this effects package,the last BAT update meant the japancat engine effects mod no longer worked, and german fuel convoys no longer burnt and smoked when straffed,but with this package fire and loads of oily black smoke I would imagine you would get from such a target it looks great.i really like the ground smokes from buildings moving along with the wind very realistic effects, greatly adding to the immersion,i noticed you had a jcats folder minused out, how do your effects work apparently standalone yet japancats needed to be tied into an engine mod?, I think your effects are superb and well considered, many many thanks for this and all the other stuff you've done. kev.

[SAS~tsisqua]

I'm really enjoying this (as you've noticed at You Tube) and wanted to take a minute to say thanks. Best ground smoke I've seen in this game.
Bird

[WxTech]

Thanks for the compliments, gents.

There's still much room for improvement. For instance, I've not taken full advantage of the 4 varieties of bomb explosions where these sub-folders are found:
Land
Land_2
Land_dig_in
Land_2_dig_in

In the stock Explosions.class, there is a boolean (true/false) test to determine whether the basic Land pair are used or instead the Land_dig_in pair are. I can't divine what this boolean is based on, nor do I see the latter pair of folders ever used. To test this, I made one of the effects in each of the 4 folders a different and prominent, bright color, so as to see instantly which folder was called upon. The _dig_in pair never were. Now, I didn't conduct particularly exhaustive tests, and there may well be some condition under which they're utilized.

For the time being, I use a 50/50 probability test to use one pair or the other. Just to get a variety of explosions in all instances. But again, I've not put in any real effort to create a good variety.

More work to do over time. Of course, any one of you could jump on board! 

[SAS~Poltava]

A really SUPER pack of effects! Love them! Great job, WxTech!!! 

Regarding of what you just wrote on explosion effects: a greater variety of explosions from the same bombs is a great idea!!!  If you look at films then we all see that there are big variations, I guess depending on where the bomb lands (type of soil, type of house etc) and how deep it digs into the ground before exploding etc.

[Mick]

So, Mick. Not being a motorhead myself, what deteines the color of this smoke from differing engine/oil/cooler systems? Are all such emissions actual smoke, or are some uncombusted fluids? Representing fluids would involve a rather different look than for smoke.

... well, oil can burn, but not water (even with glycol added) ...

When oil burns, the smoke is between dark grey and black, and when there is a coolant leak the "smoke" (it isn't smoke in fact) is white/light grey ...

The prob is in fact with inline engines (P51, Spit, Bf109 etc ...) that both have oil and coolant, water + glycol (to prevent freezing), because according to inflicted damage, we should only have black smoke, or only white "mist" (more dense than fuel leak), or a mixture of both ... 

Radial engines should only display black smoke when their oil tank or engine is hit, since they don't use water to cool their engine ... 

I am not requesting anything, especially if the game code and major java class files are to be modified, but only trying to (roughly) explain things ... 

[WxTech]

Planes from the start were only ever given an "oil" damage hook, at least from what little I've seen so far. If hooks existed for, say, "coolant" and "radiator", we could have greater variety. A coolant leak should then terminate when the fluid runs out.

In code, oil is treated completely separately from the engine. As the engine goes through its various damage states, reflected by the evolution of its 3 smokes and fire, the oil damage effect remains always active once initiated. Including when the plane is on the ground--landed or cracked up.

I've tried to introduce into AircraftState.class an additional effect, that being for oil once on the ground. The engine and tank effects have ground equivalents, but not oil. I make the ground smokes subject to the wind, but becuse the oil smoke is for application at speed, where I make wind effect zero like the other engine/tank smokes/fire, on the ground the oil smoke clings to the plane while the other smokes drift away.

Makes me wonder if overall it might be better to make the oil damage smoke a bit subtler, and/or of shorter duration.

[SAS~tsisqua]

If anyone's using some OTHER cloud mod for the lower cumulus type and want to retain it, or happen to like the stock clouds, you can simply put a "-" (minus sign) character at the start of my "Clouds" folder name, making it :-Clouds".

Goes to show how little I know, still after all of this time. I knew I could disable files by adding a " - " to the beginning of a file name, but just now learning that I can disable an entire folder by doing the same thing. Thanks for that, WxTech. This just made my life so much better.

[vonOben]

In the main, I use particle counts along the lines of Dave's Realism Effects, which package of his was based on stock 4.12 files and so specifically intended to not be too demanding on resources.

I developed much of my stuff on my nearly 15 year old, Win 7 computer running 4.08/4.09. My phosophy is to obtain lots of action before particles start flickering or fail to draw. I suppose anyone who's used some other effect packs could indicate how mine compares...

That sound reassuring! 

By the way, I use Reshade, and one of the Bloom effects which nicely enhances the distance hazing by making it lighter, thus making the sky near the horizon yet lighter, with a pleasing, depth-enhancing aspect.

Could you please share your Reshade settings? 

Thanks in advance. 

[WxTech]

Not the most recent version of Reshade, I'm sure, but within the past year or thereabouts, and so these effects should still be included...

The main effect I use, for the horizon hazing accentuating, is:

prod80_02_Bloom

I only just the other day tried this next one, which makes for a warmer hue that somewhat accentuates the hazing aspect of the Bloom:

pd80_02_Bonus_LUT_pack

That's it; just two effects as provided, the first being the best for me and the only one if I had to pick just one.

I've looked at many others, but I suppose my needs are few.    The sharpening effects have certainly been tempting, but they get in the way of distance blurring/blending that I feel to be important. And I'd like to keep the impact on resources as light as I can.

[WxTech]

I've just this minute added my changes to AircraftState.class as supplied with BAT RedCore 4.0. I already have a good while back altered this class for 4.12, included in a mod adjusting the intensity of the nav and landing lights on the plane.

After testing the BAT version, I'll post a link to an archive containing both versions of this class in the top post. You choose the one appropriate for your install, placing its two classfiles in the root folder alongside the Explosions classfiles. Nothing else to add, for the new effects noted below exist already in this mod; now they'll be activated.

And of course the full mod archive will be updated.

In addition to the aforementioned nav/landing light changes:

- Added a height check for GND effects for engine and tank damage smoke/fire, to have them be invoked at <15m AGL (previously could be invoked at any altitude when the plane goes below the speed threshold of 10 m/s, as in a zoom climb stall.)

- Added new effects for engine explosions, which formerly were shared with tank explosions. Better to have variety, and an engine blowing up should be expected to exhibit a different appearance than a tank explosion.