Q. How do I change AI controlled aircrafts' and vehicles' weapon load outs in missions?

A. Make the mission using the Pro Mission Creator, or the Quick Mission Creator. Outside of the game browse to the Fighters Anthology directory and open up the mission's .M file with a text editor. To edit quick mission load outs, your last made quick mission is named quick.m. Near the top of the file you will mission object entries. They will appear as entries like this:

obj
type SU34.PT
pos 1319758 5000 1604430
angle -72 0 0
nationality2 0
flags $17
speed 500
name
Player

controller $80
skill 1
react $c000 $0 $0
searchDist 0
wing 0 0
wng 1 1 2048 512
.

To change the aircraft's load out, add a line under the last line in the form of this:

hardpoint 5 4 AA9.JT

Hardpoint tells FA to change a hardpoint load. 5 is the number of hardpoint to be modified. Hardpoints begin number with 0. For many aircraft, hardpoints 0-2 are used for sensors and ecm, and the gun is hardpoint number 3. My JKPFA libraries follow this convention for all radar equipped aircraft, meaning hardpoint 3 is the first visible weapon, and for aircraft without radars, the first visible weapon hardpoint is hardpoint 1. The number 4 above is how many of the weapon will be loaded. And finally, AA9.JT is the filename for the weapon to be loaded, in this case 4 R-33 Amos missiles. Aircraft hardpoint weight limits or capacities, or takeoff weight limits are not taken into account, so this is a way to overload aircraft for when you just have to carry 20 AMRAAMs.

As you can see in the object entry, this is a way to also change some other normally off limits parameters, such as giving names to vehicles or ships, like the way aircraft can be named. Additionally, the skill line has a number from 0-3, corresponding to the object's skill. 0 is novice, and 3 is ace/expert. A value of 4 can be inserted here to make a "super ace," and the extra dot will actually show up on the Shift-4 target window in game. Any skill level higher than this doesn't seem to have an effect.

Q. How do I change the map overlays?

A. A great feature not often used in missions is the fact that one can change the texture given to any map. In the beginning of the .M file is this:

textFormat
brief
briefmap
armplane
map fra.T2
layer cloud1f.LAY 1

Line 6 has the overlayer given to the map by the mission. That little "f" after "cloud1" signifies the French map texture is applied to the French map ("map fra.T2). Replacing that "f" with another letter would apply a different layer. "e" corresponds with Egypt (desert), "v" with Vladivostok (blueish), "t" with Vietnam, and "b" with The Baltics.

Vietnam texture overlays on other maps look especially nice, they give a good jungle appearance. Any overlay given to the Vietnam map also creates an interesting effect.

Q. How do I make a new background screen for Fighters Anthology?

A. The background files are named CHOOSE_X_.PIC, with the opening screen always named CHOOSEV.PIC. These files can be found in the Graphics-Other Art menu of the toolkit. I recommend saving CHOOSEV.PIC outside of the toolkit, editing it, and then importing. For importing, you must follow a special procedure for the pic to work. Select to import it as an "Other", then select "Save Palette". Then, it is neccessary to delete and retype the filename. Convert it, and save it by clicking OK. It should then show up in correct colors when viewed in the toolkit.

Q. How do I make driveable vehicles?

A. The way to make driveable vehicles is to base them on a PT (aircraft) file. I recommend starting with the Basegun (filename ~basegun.pt) and modifying it to suit your vehicle. My lib also has some driveable vehicles which you could use as a base, as my lib is importable.

The trick is to keep the flight envelope (editable in the toolkit's Envelope menu for each aircraft) small enough so the speed is limited to whatever the vehicle's top speed is, and the max altitude is low too (usually it is 1000 ft for vehicles). Then your aircraft-based-vehicle in effect taxies around the map.

Q. In some of my custom missions, aircraft do not take off from their airbase, but merely taxi across the ground. What causes this?

A. This problem is caused by the nationality alignment assignment of the runway and can affect AI flights and your wingmen.

Each FA map has default friendly and enemy national assignments. The problem is caused by changing these assignments. If one changes the friendly/enemy status of a runway that by default was enemy, and then place on that runway aircraft of a nationality that was by default friendly, the aircraft will not take off.

This also works in reverse. For example, on the Baltics map, Estonia is by default friendly (blue). If Estonia is changed to enemy, then Russian (default enemy, and still enemy in this scenario) aircraft are placed on the runway, they will not take off. Estonian aircraft (now enemy) may take off (I'm not sure), so that could be a potential work-around.

Q. When I add alot of weapons to Fighters Anthology in a custom library, fuel tanks and ECM devices disappear from the Load Ordinance screen. How do I prevent this?

A. Fighters Anthology has a limited number of edited and addon weapons that can be added, before fuel tanks and ECM disappear from the Load Ordinance screen. The fuel tanks and ECM will be loaded on an aircraft if a mission skips the Load Ordinance screen.

If you have added alot of weapons into FA using a custom library, the only way to get the fuel tanks and ECM devices to return to the Load Ordinance screen is to remove weapons from your lib until the fuel and ECM devices return. They will return one at a time.

There are a few ways to maximize how many weapons your lib can have before fuel and ECM disappear. One way is to edit every default FA weapon, and then add any add-on weapons you need. It seems that FA has a limit only on add-on weapons, that is, weapons with new filenames. Therefore, if you can replace default weapons you feel are unneccessary or redundant with new weapons, you may not need to add as many weapons with new filenames.

A second way to add a capacity for about a dozen new weapons is to split up your weapons into two custom libraries. Then, after building both, place both into your Fighters Anthology directory. The procedure is to move about half of your total edited (edited default and new addon) weapons into a second library project.

Q. How do I get ships/vehicles to engage air and ground targets at ranges greater than visual range?

A. The method I have found to work the best is to create a long range visual seeker. Edit one of the VisXXX.See files, renaming it and giving it a range of whatever is neccessary for your ships/vehicles to fully use their weaponry. I recommend a generic long range seeker that can be given to several (or all) of your vehicles. Give this seeker to your ships/vehicles in their hardpoints menu. Then, load up your ship/vehicle with whatever weaponry you want.

Notes on weapons: 1. Make sure that ships can slew the weapons, and that all the weapons given to an object are secondary except for one. Secondary indicates that the vehicle doesn't need to "think" about targeting and firing it, and therefore will not turn toward the target.

2. Ships will fire all Air-to-Ground weaponry, and purposely-built radar-guided SAMs (designated as "Air-to-Ground"). Ships will fire air-to-air missiles with all guidance methods except radar. For a ship to fire an air-to-air missile, either semi-active guidance or active radar, they must be provided with a radar seeker. This can be in addition to an extended-range visual seeker.