Q: How do I make units?
A: See this post.
Q: How do I disable units for human players and AI or just the AI?
A: To remove stand alone third-party units, isolate the ufo/hpi/ccx file in your TA directory (C:\Cavedog\TotalA) where the unit is located using a hpi viewing utility like hpiview, and delete that file. Be sure that nothing else depends on the files that maybe inside this ufo/hpi/ccx file, or it might cause TA to crash on loading.
To prevent a unit from being built by the ai, extract all the data inside ufo/hpi/ccx file containing the unit in your TA directory into a folder a hpi extracting utility like hpiview. Open up the unit’s fbi file (the file name uses the unit’s unitname and it may not be intuitive what it is, you can open the fbi file and look at the line “name=” to determine which unit it is; for example, the arm hover transport’s fbi file is named “ARMTHOVR”) located in the “unit” subdirectory with notepad or wordpad. Change the “side=” to something other than the side which builds the unit (for example, to prevent a Core unit from being built by the ai, change “side=core” to “side=whatever”). Save the fbi file, and compile the folder into the same ufo/hpi/ccx file you extracted the files from using a hpi packing utility like HPIPack.
To disable an OTA unit or a single unit in a mod for both the ai and the player, create a folder in your in your TA directory named “units”. Extract the fbi from the “units” subdirectory using hpiview into the “units” folder you have just created. This disable the unit’s build menu, making it gray. This is not recommended, as it will disable the unit for everyone during an online game, and this could be perceived as cheating.
If having a gray buildpic bothers you, then it is a bit more complicated. If the unit is third party, then most likely you’ll need to extract the file containing the unit’s buildmenu information, a tdf file in the “download” subdirectory. The download tdf for the unit “ARMVULC” will have these lines in it, where "" = anything: Code:
[MENUENTRY] { UNITMENU=; MENU=; BUTTON=*; UNITNAME=ARMVULC; }
It may not be very obvious what this file is, and a single unit may have more than one of such files. You’ll create a folder in the TA directory named “download.” Extract all the tdf files relating to the unit you wish to disable into the “download” folder you have just created, and remove only those entries concerning unit you wish to disable. This process will not effect anyone but you and your ai during a multiplayer game.
If the unit you are trying to disable via the buildmenu is from OTA or Core Contingency, it may not use download tdfs to store its buildmenu location. If it doesn’t you’ll have to edit the gui files, go to the “guis” subdirectory, find the all gui files with the unitname of the construction units or plants that build the unit you are trying to disable plus a number (for example, if you want the Brawler, you’d look for the Arm Advanced Aircraft Planet - “ARMAAP1.gui”). Extract that file into a folder called “guis” in your TA directory. Open up the file you’ve extracted with notepad or wordpad and find the entry with your unit’s unitname in it. it should look something like this for the Core Advanced Construction Vehicle: Code:
[GADGET4] { [COMMON] { id=1; assoc=77; name=CORACV; xpos=0; ypos=27; width=64; height=64; attribs=32; colorf=15; colorb=0; texturenumber=0; fontnumber=0; active=1; commonattribs=4; } status=0; text=; quickkey=0; }
Remove all and only the entries concerning your unit and save. This process will not effect anyone but you and your ai during a multiplayer game. Make sure you use the guis from rev31.gp3. If it is not there, then look through Totala1.hpi, or you might end up disable units from later patches by using outdated buildmenus.
TA can only support a limited number of unique unit and weapon types. If you want to save the slots for more units, you can use the build menu method and the fbi method in conjunction. To remove unused weapons left by these deleted units, you can use TA Conflict Crusher.
Q: How do I create an AI?
A: The answer can probably be found here.
Q: I put my AI file into C:\CAVEDOG\TOTALA\AI and nothing happens
A: You need a map that uses your AI for the AI to take into effect. However, you can overwrite some Cavedog AIs used by the official maps. You can overwrite these files with your AI txt file: default.TXT, AirBattle.TXT, Hover.TXT, Krogoth.TXT, Metal.TXT, SeaBattle.TXT, Urban.TXT, Waterwrld.TXT, and Acid.TXT. Each of these will only affect some maps, and third-party maps may use their own AI you don’t know about.
Q: I know how to make skirmish levels, but how do i make campaigns?
A: Get Cavedog’s map editor TAE(B) for missions. Read the readme, look at the campaigns’ hpi structures with HPIView. Also have a look at this thread & The Mission FAQ posted there.
Q: What program would be ideal for editing TA/TAK GUI?
A: You can use Notepad or any text editor.