I'll look to buying the rules. Will then take me a couple of days to read through and work out what has changed.

Ive seen how many games you are playing, so understand wanting to play a defending game rather than worrying about an offensive game !

Will be interesting to see how my views on the rules and the actual rules differ !

Are you okay with me sending emails to the address you use for this site? Feel free to message the one in my username.

Edit: just noticed you dont have email associated here. Feel free to email me though.

By Jason Langdon (Jaspar) on Thursday, June 05, 2014 - 07:58 pm: Edit

Hi James, hoping you can help here.

Ive just got the latest version of Vassal and F&E (F&E is from the link at the top).

When I try to install the inactive mods I get an error message saying that Vassal cant open them.

Any thoughts?

Cheers.

By James Lowry (Rindis) on Friday, June 06, 2014 - 02:33 am: Edit

My first thought is, 'are you trying to activate them while the module is open?'

Beyond that, you are right clicking them in the module manager and choosing 'activate', yes?

I'd be interested in knowing the exact error message you're getting if so.

Failing the first two, try manually moving the files from the 'inactive' directory they're in, to the 'F&E 1.3.1_ext' directory that that is in.

By Jason Langdon (Jaspar) on Friday, June 06, 2014 - 08:38 am: Edit

I moved the file to the root directory and tried to open it and it had an error, but when I just loaded a saved game it said that the extension is loaded.

So it looks like it is actually working now.

Im able to open the save file without the warning aboutmissing modules, so I think all is good !

By John de Michele (Jdemichele) on Tuesday, June 10, 2014 - 06:22 pm: Edit

@James:

Is there a way that I can help out with getting the LDR/Seltorians/Vudar into the game? I have CL 45/46/47.

By James Lowry (Rindis) on Wednesday, June 11, 2014 - 09:59 pm: Edit

John: Hmm. Well, two of those I have the on-line SITs for (don't know if they've been updated, just knowing yea or nay on that would be a start).

I suppose if you were to hand me counter images it would get a lot easier to go plug them in to the module. Of course, I've done them so as to maintain a consistent style, so....

Of course, that would be easier with the new module, as I'm doing the counters in CorelDraw, and if you have that or Illustrator, I can hand you a file that will make things turn out about right.

One thing that would help a lot with the Vudar is some good images of what their ships look like (top view...) and how big they are compared to other ships.... LDR is really just getting around to doing recolors and factors.

Now, speaking of the v2.0 module, I've finally put some time into it again:
F&E Vassal Module 2.0 Work

By John de Michele (Jdemichele) on Thursday, June 12, 2014 - 12:14 am: Edit

@James:

SITs: I can check the SITs against what was published in CL.

Counters: I'm pretty sure that I have at least some of the Seltorian SFB counters, so I can scan them for you to at least give you a point of reference. I honestly haven't kept up with SFB in years, so I don't have F2 for the Vudar. I don't have CorelDraw or Illustrator.

The Cyberboard F&E gamebox has Vudar counters. They've moved away from the silhouette style, but it may be helpful as an alternative.

By John de Michele (Jdemichele) on Thursday, June 12, 2014 - 10:17 pm: Edit

@James:

Confirmed that the online Vudar SIT is current, minus four new ships added in CL47. The master SIT is not reproduced in CL47.

By Ken Kazinski (Kjkazinski) on Friday, June 13, 2014 - 04:12 pm: Edit

James,

RE: - Crippled SE values (non-integers not possible under Vassal 3.2)

Have you thought multiplying the value by a large integer (value x 1E6 or 1E4) and then displaying the integer and decimal value as a string.

This was done by many computers back in the early 80's to simulate floating points.

By James Lowry (Rindis) on Friday, June 13, 2014 - 09:51 pm: Edit

I looked at it. Here's the main relevant post from my thread on the Vassal forum about it:

---

Quote:

Okay, I looked at using a Calculated Property this time. Set a Dynamic Property (SEB) to double what SE should be, then set a Calculated Property (SE) to SEB/2.

That actually partially worked. A '4' SEB reported as '2' SE in the stack viewer, naturally. However, a '1' SEB reported as '0' instead of '0.5' in the stack viewer. Which is an improvement, as just setting a Dynamic Property to 0.5 just gets a "?" in the stack viewer. Stacking two counters at 0.5 SE each still reports 0 however, so it's getting truncated on the Calculated Property side, which is probably why the stack viewer is fine.

---

By John de Michele (Jdemichele) on Saturday, June 14, 2014 - 12:54 am: Edit

Sounds like Java is dividing in half, which will round down.

By James Lowry (Rindis) on Saturday, June 14, 2014 - 01:08 am: Edit

The operation would be handled by Vassal's Java code, yes.

By Ken Kazinski (Kjkazinski) on Saturday, June 14, 2014 - 12:55 pm: Edit

James,

Show the number in 1,000's then. 1000 would be 1 while 500 would be a half.

If you can split it you could use something like:

IntVal = Value / 1000
DecVal = Value - IntVal * 1000

Display: IntVal + "." + DecVal

By Richard B. Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Saturday, June 14, 2014 - 12:57 pm: Edit

Maybe double the SE, add 1, THEN divide by 2?

By James Lowry (Rindis) on Saturday, June 14, 2014 - 02:59 pm: Edit

Unfortunately, at that point, the problem is the stack viewer. It's very limited, with a few global variables it can access (like the name of the position of the stack) and one function: sum. I can't do math inside the stack viewer, after I have the sum.

My previous attempts had been trying to trick Vassal into passing good data for the stack viewer for that reason.

Rich, I'm not sure what that's meant to do, other than round cripples up to 1, instead of down to 2....

The good news is that the fleet marker project is going forward at the moment. I'm worried that the number of required traits will bog down the module, but first is figuring out how to do it at all.

By John de Michele (Jdemichele) on Saturday, June 14, 2014 - 08:01 pm: Edit

@James:

Email sent, in re: Seltorians.

By Aaron Bianco (Chovesh) on Monday, July 14, 2014 - 10:54 am: Edit

I downloaded both Vassal and the module. I have a hard copy of the game itself.

After some initial difficulty finding the map to play on itself. I opened the game "The Wind."

My question is: Are the initial forces for this scenario already set aside, or do you have to put them together yourself?

By Keith Plymale (Zaarin7) on Monday, July 14, 2014 - 11:07 am: Edit

On my copy of Vassal all the at start forces are on the map. Is that what you were asking?

By Aaron Bianco (Chovesh) on Monday, July 14, 2014 - 12:38 pm: Edit

yes.
I may have missed it. I will check again.

By Aaron Bianco (Chovesh) on Sunday, July 27, 2014 - 07:56 pm: Edit

I have a hard copy of the base game, and in addition I've also downloaded the vassal version.

How do I make it so that the vassal version only has the pieces for the base game?

By John de Michele (Jdemichele) on Sunday, July 27, 2014 - 07:57 pm: Edit

Delete the stacks that are marked with the expansions that you're not using.

By James Lowry (Rindis) on Wednesday, December 17, 2014 - 03:19 pm: Edit

Okay, at long last, I have a proper test type of the Version 2.0 Vassal module ready.

Here's the current feature list:
New features:
x Choice of regular and large-scale maps.
x Stack viewer & inventory counts *ships* and *SEs*.
x Flag captured ships to new empire.
x Fix 'crippled' reporting on single-sided units.
x Large Fleet markers. May need a second set for the 'small' map.
* Make sector/cordon borders independent layers to be switched on/off in module (small map only so far)
x Battle markers are independent for each side - has a Retrograde side to mark eligibility
x Show all survey ship slots on charts.

Not appearing in this module:
- Crippled SE values (non-integers not possible under Vassal 3.2)
o Display fleet stats on hover over. (currently canceled, and will probably bog down module even if it works)

Still planned:
* How to mark captured planets, etc, on LSM: bigger markers, smaller planet symbols, what?
* Mark repaired/built ships as capable of free Strat Moves (wipe automatically when moved?).
* Give EW/AF modes to scouts with variable EW.
* Do an Early Beginnings map (Provinces as overlays?)

I've got just about everything in for the Federation and Klingons (and nothing else).

There are two things I'd like:
1) as many people as possible to look over the new version and comment.
2) a small game to test out the new module in use (presumably Sector D of one of the GW scenarios).

Contact me and ask for the module if you'd like to see it.

By John de Michele (Jdemichele) on Wednesday, December 17, 2014 - 04:04 pm: Edit

Will pre-2.0 saved games be compatible?

By Richard B. Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Wednesday, December 17, 2014 - 04:22 pm: Edit

Anywhere we can see screenshots?

By James Lowry (Rindis) on Wednesday, December 17, 2014 - 04:47 pm: Edit

No, this is an all-new module, with all-new graphics. In fact, I started it because I was having more and more trouble with the map.

Thankfully, the v1-series is in very good shape, and I do have an update ready for when the new FO is released (I want to verify what actually gets published), so there's no reason to not finish existing games in it once the new one is released; which could still be a long time from now.

Nothing 'in action' available right now, but there's a couple of shots showing the big map here:
https://www.boardgamegeek.com/blogpost/13074/fe-vassal-v2someday
https://www.boardgamegeek.com/blogpost/31150/fe-vassal-module-20-work