CHAPTER 2 - FILES 

    First problem to deal with, the name of your mission file and the mission.lst file; if you want to be able to playtest your mission while creating it, you will need to have a functional one.

Mission file name

You must follow a certain format for your mission files names, at least for its beginning. They should be under the form:

1B (# of battle) M (# of mission ) (whatever you want).tie

for example: 1B8M1_mymission.tie for the first mission of the eighth battle (any custom mission should be installed after the Battle of Endor).

If you don't follow this, your briefing is going to crash. 

Mission.lst file

    .lst files are used by XWA to list the custom files needed, such as waves files or mission files. The "mission.lst" file located in the XWA/Missions directory lists all the mission files used. It is a text format file, that you can edit with Notepad. The lst file can also be edited with AlliED which has got a very neat lst file manager, but let's do it the old way.

The file is constituted of battle headers, and groups of 3 lines per mission.

A battle header is under the form:

//
!BATTLE_(# of battle)_HEADER![Description of the battle]
//

for example:

//
!BATTLE_2_HEADER![Battle 2: Secret Weapons of the Empire]
//

Each mission is numerated, beginning with 0. Missions 0 to 52 are then referring to the original XWA missions.
Each corresponding group of lines appears under the form:

(# of mission)
* (mission file name)
!MISSION_(# of mission)_DESC!(description of the mission)

for example:

16
* 1B2M1G.tie
!MISSION_16_DESC!Flight Staff Transfer
 

Add your custom mission to the mission.lst file. For example, here is what is added to the original mission.lst file for IW-XWA Battle 26:

//
!BATTLE_8_HEADER![IW Battle 26: Ambassadors]
//
53
* 1B8M1_IW26.tie
!MISSION_53_DESC!Dancing with the Wolves
54
* 1B8M2_IW26.tie
!MISSION_54_DESC!Unexpected encounter
55
* 1B8M3_IW26.tie
!MISSION_55_DESC!Beware of the Snake
56
* 1B8M4_IW26.tie
!MISSION_56_DESC!Blind and deaf
57
* 1B8M5_IW26.tie
!MISSION_57_DESC!Free-loaders
 

Pilot file

    You should have placed your mission as mission number 53, you may be wondering how you will be able to play it without playing all the original missions of XWA. The next step is to create a custom pilot file, to be able to play directly the mission: create a new pilot with XWA, with whatever name you want, then edit the pilot file (.plt) with XWA Piloteer. change "Current Mission" to [Reserved 1]. Make a backup of the edited file, this backup will be the one you will include with your mission file and mission.lst file if you want to release it. You will use the other copy to playtest your mission.

Introduction - AlliED Interface - Mission Making - FAQs
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