Locations

Every mission happens somewhere. A mission lists the places it can appear, and the game picks one of them each time the mission is created. This page explains how that choice works, what the location flags mean, lists every place that ships with the game, with its coordinates, and shows how a mod adds places of its own.

How a location is chosen

When a mission is created, the game draws one entry from the mission's list of locations (_potentialLocations in the mission JSON). If that spot is already used by another mission on the map, it draws again, up to five more times. If every draw comes up taken, it keeps the last one, so two missions can end up sharing a location.

If a mission lists no locations at all, the game falls back to a random place from the full list: the places that ship with the game plus any that enabled mods add (see Adding locations with a mod).

Distance is not decoration: the fuel a flight costs is worked out from the great-circle distance (the shortest distance over the globe) between the location and the loaded map's own coordinates, multiplied by FuelConsumptionPerKilometer from the Variables table (see CSV tables). A mission over Berlin is far more expensive to fly than one over the Channel.

Using a location

In the Mission Editor, open the Locations section, pick a place from the dropdown and add it. Add as many as you like; the same place cannot be added twice.

In a mission .json, each entry of _potentialLocations names a place by its ID:

{
    "_locationId": "dover"
}

Field	Meaning
_locationId	Required, and the only field the game reads from the entry. It must be the ID of a place from the list below or of one that an enabled mod adds (see Adding locations with a mod).

The place's coordinates, flags and display name come from that list, not from the mission file. A _locationName, _coordinates or _flags left on the entry is ignored.

An entry whose ID is missing, empty or unknown is never found. When the drawn entry cannot be found, the game falls back to a random location.

The ID is also what the game uses to tell whether a spot is already taken, so it avoids placing two live missions on the same ID where it can (see How a location is chosen).

A list with several places lets the same mission turn up in different spots:

"_potentialLocations": [
    { "_locationId": "dover_strait" },
    { "_locationId": "english_channel" },
    { "_locationId": "seine_bay" }
]

From a script, a script-only mission (one without a .json) is placed with missions_api.SetMissionLocation(mission_entity_id, location_id), usually from initialize_mission. It accepts only the ID of a place from the list below or of one that an enabled mod adds (see Adding locations with a mod), never coordinates of your own, and returns False for an unknown ID. Without a location, a script-only mission sits at the map origin. See Reference.

Location flags

Value	Name	Meaning
0	None	none
1	Land	over land
2	Sea	over the sea
4	OwnTerritory	over friendly territory
8	EnemyTerritory	over enemy territory

They add up, so 10 is Sea + Enemy territory (2 + 8) - the most common value for a coastal target on the far side of the Channel. Some combinations:

Value	Flags
3	Land + Sea
5	Land + OwnTerritory
6	Sea + OwnTerritory
9	Land + EnemyTerritory
10	Sea + EnemyTerritory
12	OwnTerritory + EnemyTerritory

A place with several flags passes a quest condition for each of them: a 10 place counts for both location,sea and location,enemyterritory.

In the shipped game, location flags are used only to unlock the built-in airplane skins: hidden skin quests such as "fly 20 missions over the sea with a Beaufighter" use location,sea, location,ownterritory and location,enemyterritory. No other shipped quest checks them.

Flags come from the location list, not from your mission file

A mission's location entry carries only the ID; a _flags value left on it is ignored. Quest steps such as "fly a mission over the sea" look the mission's location ID up in the location list - the places below plus any that enabled mods add - and use the flags recorded there. The quest step writes the flag name, not the number: location,sea, location,ownterritory, location,enemyterritory (see Quests).

Because no shipped location carries Land, a location,land condition can never be met unless a mod adds a place with that flag.

The locations that ship with the game

82 places are predefined. Reuse them rather than inventing coordinates: they are positioned to line up with the war map, and the player will recognise them. They run from latitude 44.87 to 60.38 and longitude -9.00 to 14.55.

In the table, Own is OwnTerritory (4), Enemy is EnemyTerritory (8), Sea is Sea (2); combined entries add up (Sea + Enemy = 10).

ID	Latitude	Longitude	Flags
aarhus	56.1509	10.1799	Enemy
amiens	49.8980	2.3286	Enemy
amsterdam	52.3713	4.8995	Sea + Enemy
arras	50.2933	2.7758	Enemy
atlantic_ocean	56.5000	-9.0000	Sea
bergen	60.3829	5.3042	Sea + Enemy
berlin	52.5217	13.3958	Enemy
birmingham	52.4907	-1.8466	Own
bordeaux	44.8695	-0.5592	Sea + Enemy
boulogne-sur-mer	50.7246	1.6019	Sea + Enemy
bremen	53.0869	8.7973	Enemy
bremerhaven	53.5352	8.5838	Sea + Enemy
brest	48.3912	-4.4851	Sea + Enemy
bristol_channel	51.3681	-4.2301	Sea
brussels	50.8552	4.3559	Enemy
caen	49.1857	-0.3894	Sea + Enemy
calais	50.9587	1.8552	Sea + Enemy
cambridge	52.1925	0.1337	Own
canterbury	51.2733	1.0855	Own
cardigan_bay	52.5000	-4.6000	Sea
celtic_sea	50.8000	-7.5000	Sea
chelmsford	51.7352	0.4673	Own
cologne	50.9375	6.9517	Enemy
compiegne	49.3991	2.8277	Enemy
dedham_vale	51.9878	0.9096	Own
dieppe	49.9189	1.0747	Sea + Enemy
dogger_bank	54.9952	3.0143	Sea
dorchester	50.7106	-2.4410	Own
dover	51.1351	1.3128	Own
dover_strait	51.0598	1.5825	Sea
dunkirk	51.0370	2.3788	Sea + Enemy
dunkirk_bay	51.3082	2.1831	Sea
eastbourne_bay	50.6432	0.4435	Sea
eindhoven	51.4497	5.3770	Enemy
english_channel	50.1660	-1.7013	Sea
essen	51.4535	7.0060	Enemy
frankfurt	50.1028	8.6791	Enemy
great_yarmouth_bay	52.5492	2.2980	Sea
guernsey	49.4438	-2.5571	Sea
hamburg	53.5381	9.9669	Sea + Enemy
hanover	52.3736	9.7400	Enemy
hardangervidda	60.0327	7.4297	Enemy
high_weald	51.0563	0.4398	Own
ipswich	52.0524	1.1532	Own
irish_sea	53.5000	-4.8000	Sea
kassel	51.3127	9.4948	Enemy
krefeld	51.3394	6.5521	Enemy
kristiansand	58.1581	7.9766	Sea + Enemy
la_rochelle	46.1597	-1.1592	Sea + Enemy
lannion	48.7372	-3.4625	Sea + Enemy
le_havre	49.5003	0.1352	Sea + Enemy
leeuwarden	53.2037	5.7917	Sea + Enemy
liege	50.6413	5.5752	Enemy
lille	50.6252	3.0551	Enemy
london	51.5090	-0.1280	Own
maastricht	50.8474	5.6870	Enemy
maidstone	51.2707	0.5203	Own
malvern_hills	52.1034	-2.3512	Own
metz	48.9610	6.1310	Enemy
munster	51.9645	7.6099	Enemy
nancy	48.6921	6.1844	Enemy
nantes	47.2216	-1.5501	Enemy
north_channel	55.1000	-5.6000	Sea
north_sea	56.5000	3.5000	Sea
north_wessex	51.4482	-1.4938	Own
outer_silver_pit	54.0262	2.0864	Sea
paris	48.8535	2.3188	Enemy
raf_duxford	52.0933	0.1311	Own
raf_filton	51.5218	-2.5746	Own
raf_manston	51.3461	1.3490	Own
raf_tangmere	50.8464	-0.7095	Own
reims	49.2570	4.0438	Enemy
rotterdam	51.9302	4.4752	Sea + Enemy
rotterdam_bay	51.9939	3.1666	Sea
rouen	49.4381	1.0937	Enemy
seine_bay	49.7154	-0.6720	Sea
south_downs	50.9450	-0.6643	Own
st_georges_channel	52.0000	-5.8000	Sea
stettin	53.4282	14.5511	Sea + Enemy
telemark	59.3766	8.3060	Enemy
the_wash	52.9159	0.2530	Sea
tours	47.3933	0.6825	Enemy

Two further entries exist in the game's list but are development leftovers - do not use them: test1 and ireland. Neither carries any flag, and ireland is not in Ireland.

Adding locations with a mod

A mod can add its own places to the list, so its missions - and anyone else's - can use them by ID. Put one or more .json files into a Locations folder inside your mod's Missions/ folder:

Mods/
  my_mod/
    Missions/
      Locations/
        mymod_locations.json

Only files directly inside Missions/Locations/ are read. A file looks like this:

{
    "Locations": [
        {
            "_locationId": "mymod_scapa_flow",
            "_locationName": "mymod_scapa_flow",
            "_coordinates": { "x": 58.9, "y": -3.1 },
            "_flags": 2
        }
    ]
}

The Locations list holds as many places as you like. Each entry has four fields:

Field	Meaning
_locationId	Required. The ID missions and scripts use to refer to the place.
_locationName	The name the player sees (see below).
_coordinates	x is latitude, y is longitude, in degrees. Used for the marker on the war map and for the distance (and so the fuel cost).
_flags	A number describing the place (Location flags). Must be a number - "Sea" is not accepted.

• While your mod is enabled, its places are on the list, and they leave it when the mod is switched off or removed. Switching a mod on or off updates the list without restarting the game.
• A place from a mod behaves like a shipped one. It is offered in the Mission Editor's dropdown, works with missions_api.SetMissionLocation, can be drawn for a mission that lists no locations, and its flags are what quest location conditions see.
• _locationId is the lookup key, so it has to be unique. Shipped IDs always win. If your place uses an ID the game already has, the shipped one is used. If two mods add the same ID, the game uses one of them and does not tell you. So give every place your mod's prefix, as in mymod_scapa_flow.
• An entry without an ID can never be found, neither by a mission nor by missions_api.SetMissionLocation.
• The player sees _locationName exactly as written, underscores and all. Shipped places come with translations; yours has none until you register a term called mission_location/<name> - see Location names.
• A file the game cannot read is skipped, with a warning in Player.log. Your other location files still load.
• Keep the coordinates inside the war map (see the next section).

Using your own coordinates

A mission file cannot carry coordinates of its own: it only names a place by ID, and the coordinates and flags come from the location list (the shipped places and any added by a mod). An ID that is not on the list is never found, and the mission goes to a random location instead. To put a mission somewhere new, add the place with a mod and refer to it by its ID - from a mission file and from missions_api.SetMissionLocation alike.

The war map shows latitude 40.75 to 61.25 and longitude -11.75 to 21.64 (a Mercator projection, the usual flat world map). The range of the shipped places above is simply where they happen to be, not the map's limit. A location outside the map's box still works - distance and fuel are just maths - but its marker is pushed to the nearest edge of the map, so the player sees it at the border rather than where it really is. It stays clickable.

Tip

Give your own places an ID with your mod's prefix (mymod_scapa_flow). An ID the game already has is not yours to define: the shipped place wins.