.DAT File Schemas

[sage2]

Being able to play past 1925 (a likely feature of 1.1 from what the dev has said) will create an opportunity for a mod that extends gun, ships, armor and technology past 1925 (perhaps in a fictional way where air-power at sea never developed). It would be useful to have a modding thread where people can post their understanding of how the .dat files store game value, and interact. I'll start with what I understand so far.

A useful experiment would be to see if there's enough exposed data in these files to add new items, such as a new torpedo type that could be research and mounted, or new army thicknesses allowed after certain improvements. It's not clear what's needed vs. what's hard coded.

The interesting game play files that I see are:

gundata.dat:

c sw ROF mr
'c' is caliber

'ROF' appears to be rounds per minute base value

sw - shell weight, presumably used for calculating ammunition storage weights in designs?

mr - maximum range

hpen.dat
Table for horizontal (deck) penetration. These appear to be the 'maximum' end of game values. Rows are for caliber, columns are ranges.

vpen.dat
Table for vertical (belt) penetration. Likewise, these seem to be 'maximum' end of game values. Same convention for rows/columns as above.

Range in both of the above appears to be in miles? or possible 1000 yard increments?

In both of the above, the numbers seem to be tenths of a inch , so 360 = 36in.

ordanance.dat

'Cal' is caliber

'Cat' is category, probably used in log messages, e.g. "Small / Medium / Large guns fired by enemy"

Weight and Cost are evident

TF1 - TF3, TFC , SW -- not clear what these are or how they are used.

I think this file is where damage values are stored, however, as I don't see another place they would likely be. I'm not sure how to read them, however.

researchareas.dat

Controls the different researchable technologies.

Not clear how this works:

Hydraulic recoil;1900;Y;100;3;59;Gradual national ROF improvement

speculation:

'Name';[default year];[spreads to others?];?;?;?;'Game displayed description'

speedHPtable.dat

Not clear how this works. I think this might be a multiplier factored against the weight of a ship to calculate the required horsepower value.

TorpedoData.dat

May be un-used by RTW game engine?

TYPE - type (category)

CAL - caliber

WH - weight?

RH, SL  - I think these are ranges at high speed and low speed, but it's not clear what the unit of measurement is. It might be a multiplier against speed to identify actual range.

SH, SL - I think these are 'high speed' and 'low speed' values

TYPE CAL WH RH SH RL SL N

[elouda]

Jul 28, 2015 16:30:39 GMT -6 sage2 said:

Being able to play past 1925 (a likely feature of 1.1 from what the dev has said) will create an opportunity for a mod that extends gun, ships, armor and technology past 1925 (perhaps in a fictional way where air-power at sea never developed). It would be useful to have a modding thread where people can post their understanding of how the .dat files store game value, and interact. I'll start with what I understand so far.

A useful experiment would be to see if there's enough exposed data in these files to add new items, such as a new torpedo type that could be research and mounted, or new army thicknesses allowed after certain improvements. It's not clear what's needed vs. what's hard coded.

The interesting game play files that I see are:

gundata.dat:

c sw ROF mr
'c' is caliber

'ROF' appears to be rounds per minute base value

not clear what sw and mr are

hpen.dat

not clear how this filed is used. It appears to be a range table of some kind.

ordanance.dat

'Cal' is caliber

'Cat' is category, though it's not clear how the game uses this

Weight and Cost are evident

TF1 - TF3, TFC , SW -- not clear what these are or how they are used.

I think this file is where damage values are stored, however, as I don't see another place they would likely be.

researchareas.dat

Controls the different researchable technologies.

Not clear how this works:

Hydraulic recoil;1900;Y;100;3;59;Gradual national ROF improvement

speculation:

'Name';[earliest year];?;?;?;?;'Game displayed description'

speedHPtable.dat

Not clear how this works. I think this might be a multiplier factored against the weight of a ship to calculate the required horsepower value.

TorpedoData.dat

TYPE - type (category)

CAL - caliber

WH - weight?

RH, SL  - I think these are ranges at high speed and low speed, but it's not clear what the unit of measurement is. It might be a multiplier against speed to identify actual range.

SH, SL - I think these are 'high speed' and 'low speed' values

TYPE CAL WH RH SH RL SL N

vpen.dat

this appears to be a penetration table for different weapon types

c - caliber

sw - ?

1 - x -- this may be range in miles

values in the table look like they be integer representing penetration in inches, with the last digit being a decimal; so 60 = 6.0 inches and 187 = 18.7 inches

30

Here's a little that I've figured out;

gundata.dat
'sw' is shell weight
'mr' is maximum range - though I think it can be exceeded with quality and improved elevation, so its more of a 'range factor'

hpen.dat
Table for horizontal (deck) penetration. These appear to be the 'maximum' end of game values. Rows are for caliber, columns are ranges.

vpen.dat
Table for vertical (belt) penetration. Likewise, these seem to be 'maximum' end of game values. Same convention for rows/columns as above.

In both of the above, the numbers seem to be tenths of a inch , so 360 = 36in.
Also in both of the above, the 'sw' column is again shell weight, with '30p' (blank on hpen) unknown. I think it might be related to damage, but unsure.

ordanance.dat
'Cat' is category, and probably determines the type of message you get when enemy (ie unknown) size guns fire - for these you see 'BB (Name) fires X light/medium/heavy guns'.
No idea on the others, I at one point thought TF1-3 might be related to turreted weights, but no longer sure. SW is really confusing, as it would imply connection to the earlier 'sw' (shell weight), but the numbers are off for that.

speedHPtable.dat
Lookup table, with displacement as rows and speed as columns, these seem to be interpolated between and then have some other factors applied to give vessel horsepower.

TorpedoData.dat
I think this is unused, the numbers bear no resemblance to the 'tech level' torpedoes in game, instead these are what looks like historical data for various torpedoes? 'N' at the end is for 'nation' it would seem. Might be a reference file or one from SAI that is now unused?

researchareas.dat
Agreed with controls (some parts?) of research.

I think the 'year' is for 'default year', ie. the point at which it should normally be available, but you can get them before this with breakthroughs, events or focused research.
For the rest of it, I would assume at least one of the values to be 'research cost'.
Also, completely speculative, but the 'N/Y' might be if this is a 'visible' or 'spreadable' technology or not - meaning once someone builds something using it, it becomes easier for everyone else to acquire - note that most of the 'Y' are on things like turret layouts, bigger DDs, etc. Not sure though.

[sage2]

Thanks! I've added updates into the original post.