New loco: BR 01.5?

[DTL98]

I am currently working on creating a BR 01.5, which is an improved version of the BR 01 (in RT3 as the Class 01) used by the DB (modified in 1955, used into late '70s, early '80s). I am making this because there is a lack of new European steam locomotives after 1950. I am planning on using the regular Class 01 3dp files, and editing the start and end dates, pulling power, and, (possibly), speed using the regular Class 01 .lco and .car files. I do, however, have a few questions. Could someone help?
1. Which block(s) of code do I edit when I have the .lco/.car file(s) in the hex editor to change the pulling power and start/end date?
2. Does anyone think it would be possible to have the new .car and .lco files programmed to use the class 01 .3dp files without copying them (the class 01 .3dp files) and reassign a separate Class 01 .pk4 file (with a different skin)?
Please help?

*I have already read Bombardier's tutorial; I just need some help with the hex editing as well as some other details*

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This locomotive is now available in the archives: http://www.mediafire.com/file/nmpygwixm ... R_01_5.zip

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[Gumboots]

See this post for how to edit the start and stop years, as well as .3dp file name and image file name: viewtopic.php?f=67&t=3394&start=60#p35759

And this post for pulling power, speed, etc: viewtopic.php?f=67&t=3394&start=15#p34175

[DTL98]

That helps a lot!

[DTL98]

OK, so I have the .lco and .car files fixed up, as well as a PK4 with the new skin files in .dds format and all of the needed .3dp files. I loaded it all into the game to test, and I get as far as buying the locomotive. But when I click "buy" to purchase the locomotive, it crashes the game and gives me this message:
"Open PIMipmapChain: Unable to loacate a valid DDS, JPG, or TGA file for 'BR01_5'."
I made sure that all of the file names matched BR01_5, edited the .imb file to fix some other stuff, and repacked the PK4 to try again. It still gave me the same message!!!!!
I am pretty sure it has something to do with the PK4, but I am not quite sure what it is I need to edit to fix this problem. Any suggestions?

[Gumboots]

Well obviously you either have a name wrong somewhere, or a corrupted image somewhere. Hard to tell just from the error message.

[DTL98]

I went back and checked the .car files. I had the engine ID and DDS ID mixed up. It is working now! Just need to fix a few bugs.

[DTL98]

Got it finished- Almost! (Still need to figure out how to get rid of that gold Kriegslok beauty shot!)
Otherwise, this is working how it should. Any feedback would be appreciated to help me improve the final version for when I get the beauty shot fixed.

Edit: Obsolete zip removed.

[Gumboots]

Ok, I took a look at it. Couple of things.

1/ You have included a .dsc file in the PK4. The reason you have a .dsc is because you have used the train skinning tool to output your files. This is not necessary, and is what is giving you the gold Kriegslok beauty shot.

The way it works is that a .dsc file is only required for supplementary skins of existing locos. The original loco doesn't need one. Since you have included a .dsc in your pack, the game thinks this is a supplementary skin of an existing BR01_5 loco. That's why when you look at this loco in the buy listing you'll see the little up/down arrows for selecting additional skins. You can't select any others because they don't exist, but the game still treats this as one skin of several.

The next thing to be aware of is that, if you are actually making additional skins, they cannot call their own beauty shot. You have to call the same beauty shot as the base loco you are skinning. If you try to call a nifty custom beauty shot with the right colours, you'll get the gold Kriegslok. Don't ask me why. You just do. RT3 voodoo is weird stuff.

In this case the solution is simple. Just remove the .dsc from the pack and it should be fine.

2/ The train skinning tool gives you an A skin only half the size of the default BR39, which in turn means much rougher graphics. What I always do is start with the real A skin, which is 1024x1024. This file and others can be extracted from the default PK4's in the 2D and 3D directories. If you want them I already have them extracted.

3/ The other thing the train skinning tool does is to bork the alpha channel on your skins, which is what gives you that glow in the dark crap. This is easy to fix once you know how. All you need to do is to copy the alpha channel from the default skins (from A down to G) and paste it into the alpha channel of your new skins (from A down to G). You can do this via the channels view in either GIMP or Photoshop. This will give you a loco which looks clean at night.

There are other ways of achieving the same result, but for what you want the above is probably the simplest option.

4/ I think the wheels are a bit out of balance for colour with the rest of the unit, and would benefit from being toned down a little.

5/ Your stats may be a bit much for performance on grades compared to other engines in the game. RT3 generally tones down the grade performance of faster locos so that slower ones that are good haulers have a niche on grades. It's up to you how you want it to run, but I think you've coded it to be a super engine that would be a bit out of balance with the others. I'd be thinking about knocking back the free weight and pulling power slightly.

[DTL98]

Thanks for the input. I'll get to it right away!

[DTL98]

Ok. I've got the stats fixed, the skin edited, and I'm ready to work on fixing the glow-in-the-dark problem, but no matter what I do, the gold Kriegslok won't go away! I've deleted the .dsc file, and it still has the Kriegslok. I tried switching from .dds format to .tga format, and it still has the Kriegslok. I've been messing around with this for a few days now, and that golden Kriegslok won't go away!

[Gumboots]

You can't use a custom beauty shot for your new skin. You have to use the default beauty shot.

The next thing to be aware of is that, if you are actually making additional skins, they cannot call their own beauty shot. You have to call the same beauty shot as the base loco you are skinning. If you try to call a nifty custom beauty shot with the right colours, you'll get the gold Kriegslok. Don't ask me why. You just do. RT3 voodoo is weird stuff.

This means the .imb file for your new skin has to call the same beauty shot images as the default skin. If you enter a different image name, you'll get the gold Kriegslok.

[Gumboots]

Whoops. I forgot this was a new engine, not a skin, so the above doesn't apply.

Ok, so it must be a naming problem somewhere. Pack the thing up again and I'll take a look at the files. Another pair of eyes is handy for spotting things sometimes.

[DTL98]

OK, so here is the newest revision of the PK4 that I've got packed. I haven't had the time to fix all of the skins, but all of the naming should be as it was the last time I tested it (still having the gold Kriegslok).

Edit: Obsolete zip removed.

[Gumboots]

K, I'll give it a go tonight and see if I can find anything.

[Gumboots]

Found the problem. The .imb file for the BeautyShot can't be given a custom name. It has to be named as BR01_5L_NE.imb for the gold Kriegslok to go away. This is normal for all locos. Just call it ****L_NE.imb and it will be happy.

[DTL98]

Got it fixed! Just need to fix the last few skin files and then it's done!
Here is a screenshot of the loco stats:

BR 01.5 Stats.png (302.54 KiB) Viewed 11312 times

[Gumboots]

Yay!

[DTL98]

IT'S FINISHED!!!!
Here is the loco with some screenshots. You may notice that the screenshots look different from the beauty shot- I sharpened and adjusted the contrast on the skins so that the color would stand out more (more black instead of gray with a deeper red) and so the resized 512x512 to 1024x1024 skin would look better.
Here's a new German express steam loco for you to enjoy.

[Gumboots]

It'd be better to not package up six and a half meg of superfluous images with the loco files. The actual loco is only about 700 kB zipped.

[DTL98]

Oops! Didn't think of that.
Here's a new one without the extra screenshots. (I did keep the readme and stats, though.)

Edit: Obsolete zip removed.