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[UberDemon]

Preview:  The UberQuick IL-2 Template Builder/Designer (For UQMG Max, QMB and QMBPro) Experiment

Greetings!

I am excited to tell you that after much hardheaded persistence I am getting good results out of the UQMG Template Builder module within the UQMG 1946 Max suite.  It is the first of what I hope to be many mission building designer tools that will be incorporated into UQMG.  As I stated before I want UQMG to be not only a powerful quick mission generator, but also a companion for FMB mission and campaign designers.

Here is the concept:  The user chooses a map, and follow steps to provide a skeleton set of flight waypoints, then fill some information in an Excel Worksheet, import data into UQMG Template Builder, customize waypoints patterns, then generate a simple mission template that is ready to be customized in FMB, but without all the additional time that it takes to build waypoint patterns, etc, and it throws a few generic ground/sea targets that can be changed or added to.

In the near future the full QMB and QMBPro templates will be available as well, but the hardest one, the more complex 24 Flight Group UQMG Max is getting close to completion, to the point I can generate simple missions in UQMG Max.

This was only possible with help from Microsoft’s Copilot AI, which was my choice due to integration with GitHub and Visual Studio Suite.  My collaboration with AI was on creating the waypoint geometric patterns (Ellipse/Line, Crescent, Semi Circle and Diamond).  The Ellipse can be customized to resemble anything from a line to a Circle.  And the user can specify direction, and size.

Enough with the talk.  Here is the idea.

Take the Battle of France 1940 map…  Follow the steps and you have a bare template in FMB following some required steps that I’ll describe in a document.  This is what the result is… which is somewhat barebone…







Each flight has to be placed in a particular order and you setup 5 waypoints, which will be used by the template builder to make them more… uh… better.  The Excel spreadsheet looks like this:



Now we close the Excel after saving and we start UQMG 1946 Max, then we start the UQMG Template Builder, then we Import the Excel data.







Now you can customize what you want in each flight group without having to think too much.  The patterns below are available for each of your flights.


























Just so that you know, you can save your work, so I am loading a previous project meant to try to showcase the different patterns.

Now you generate the template, and you pick the original mission you created in FMB earlier.

The result is an environment with a bit more content.

It is still a sort of 70-90% solution but gives you an idea where this is going.









Here is an interesting detail though…  look that the taxi patterns are placed correctly, and at the right angle, so when I implement the ability to add dioramas, I think it will be cool and fun, I hope.









Anyhoo… that is where I am with it.

When I release the Alpha, I’ll have more features and I’ll have some instructions, tutorials.  So hopefully in the future we will have more map content available for missions.

[UberDemon]

Something else, when you create a UQMG Template Builder template, it also creates a ".properties" file that is used by UQMG to generate missions.  It creates an automatic Title for the Template using data from the map as well as the author (defined by the user in the UQMG's Briefing Editor), the sequence of waypoint properties which is encoded in the "Short" section of the properties file, and a basic description of each flight based on the user inputs from the Excel spreadsheet.  This saves time in creating a template description.  Either way this saves time!!!  Hopefully the screenshots below make sense:

[UberDemon]

The Geometric routines which took some time to help the AI be trained are pretty solid from a coding perspective.  The way it all works is that when you are setting the basic input FMB mission file, each flight you want to include requires 5 waypoints.  The algorithm takes the second and third waypoints to build a trigonometry-based geometric shape with a size parameter between the two waypoints.  Below are screenshots of the test routine I built to test all scenarios:

ELLIPSIS

Starting in the West
* Positive angle slant, clockwise route
* Negative angle slant, clockwise route
* Positive angle slant, counterclockwise route
* Negative angle slant, counterclockwise route

Starting in the East
* Positive angle slant, counterclockwise route
* Negative angle slant, counterclockwise route
* Positive angle slant, clockwise route
* Negative angle slant, clockwise route

[UberDemon]

For Crescent Shape there are 16 different cases.  I am showing half of that with an exaggerated size to display the crescent shape.

[UberDemon]

Semi-Circles (really semi-ellipsis) also have 16 different cases, which you really do not have to worry about.  The code figures it out for you based on input.  Below I am just showing a sampling of the cases again with an exaggerated size for the curve and showing you can have the pattern starting on the curve or line.

[genXgamer]

Me Homer, you Doctor.

[UberDemon]

 Same thing with Diamonds... there are 8 cases, but here I made them narrower so you can have something more akin to a line... you can do that with all Geo patterns...

[UberDemon]

Me Homer, you Doctor.

Ok...  you enter a few things in a spreadsheet after entering a few waypoints in a mission...  UQMG figures it out and make mission.  Mission good.  Play.  Get banana! 

[Dimlee]

Just wow.
Hopefully, if the player changes a couple of waypoints in that beautiful ellipse or crescent, the AI aircraft formation will accept it and behave. But we'll have to find out, I guess.
Thank you for your outstanding work!

[raf1659]

Impressive!

[UberDemon]

Just wow.
Hopefully, if the player changes a couple of waypoints in that beautiful ellipse or crescent, the AI aircraft formation will accept it and behave. But we'll have to find out, I guess.
Thank you for your outstanding work!

It is all permissible.  Originally, I worked with the AI to make it so that the full combination of waypoints in the pattern would have to be divisible by 4, but I tested with other numbers, and it works fine... just not as uniform.  For smaller maps and routes, it is better to have less waypoints, that way if you customize it after the template generation, a shift for the formation it is not too radical.  I am purposedly showing patterns with 24 waypoints between the "after takeoff" waypoint and the "destination/action" waypoint... and that is not exactly that... from after takeoff, half of the pattern leads to the destination, and the other half then is the return...

Here is what I mean...  waypoint 1 is after takeoff... waypoints 2 to 12 are the route towards the objective area...  waypoint 13 is the destination, waypoints 14 to 24 are the return.  Those two waypoints are placed by the designer in the input map... (obviously that is an example with 24 waypoints... it would be different if you were using say... 10, 11, 12... or less, or more... the patterns are defined in text files that you can add your own if you want, but that is for advanced users...)

I'll have a PDF that describes the process.

Keep in mind that something like an ellipse can be used as a line by making it really skinny...  This is what I mean...









Also today I changed the GUI (and a lot of coding!!!) to include some time saving features (look at the Default/Options area)

[UberDemon]

Impressive!

Thank you for the compliment, and thank you for your continued support.

Next step is that I want to handle the QMB template routine.  There are some changes I need to implement to handle QMB, which includes a very inflexible requirement for the regiments...  also, I need to figure out what I'll be able to implement.

I can have a template like UQMG Max with all planes having a takeoff and landing, but maybe I can adapt the logic to generate something more akin to the start in the air QMB missions.