WDDM — Warfare Dynamic Defense Manager

A browser-based, top-down composition editor for Arma "Warfare" defense templates. Lay out walls, sandbags, batteries, emplacements and checkpoints on a grid, then export ready-to-paste SQF for your mission. One file, fully offline, no install.

▶ Open the editor · Quick start · Templates · How it works · Using exports in a mission

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What it does

Arma Warfare missions place "compositions" — a parent object (a factory, or a deploy point) plus a list of child objects at relative offsets. WDDM is a visual editor for exactly that data structure. Instead of guessing [x, y, z] offsets and directions by hand, you drag objects around a top-down canvas and the tool writes the SQF for you.

Built-in doctrine layouts

All 16 engineer presets at a glance — BLUFOR vs OPFOR, Light & Heavy, laid out to Cold War defensive doctrine (NATO dispersed & concealed · Warsaw Pact massed & belted):

• Drag-and-drop layout — move objects, drag the handle to rotate, arrow-keys to nudge (Shift = 1 m), 0.5 m grid snap.
• Textured top-down icons — H-barriers, sandbags, fortified nests, camo nets, razor wire, concrete blocks, cones, and distinct silhouettes for MG / AT / AA / artillery weapons.
• Live SQF export — a missionNamespace setVariable [...] block updates as you build; one-click copy.
• Crew-cost estimator — counts crewable weapon emplacements (1 gunner each) so you can see a layout's AI cost while you design it.
• Rotation preview — a "facing" control rotates the whole composition so you can confirm it stays coherent when the building is placed at any heading (matches Arma's modelToWorld math).
• Import an existing template to edit it, and save/load your work as JSON.
• 18 built-in presets, including the four faction-specific defense types in light & heavy variants.

WDDM is engine-agnostic about what you build — any classname string works, so it's equally useful for Arma 2 (OA), Arma 3, and forks of the various Warfare modes.

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Quick start

Option A — just use it Open the hosted version: https://rayswaynl.github.io/WDDM/

Option B — run locally

git clone https://github.com/rayswaynl/WDDM.git
cd WDDM
# open index.html in any modern browser — that's it, no build step

index.html is completely self-contained (the only external request is Google Fonts, and it degrades gracefully to system fonts offline).

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Using the editor

Action	How
Load a starting layout	Pick from Load a demo / preset → Load preset
Add an object	Pick a class from the palette → + Add to centre, or + Custom… to type any classname
Move	Drag the object body
Rotate	Drag the white handle, or edit Relative direction in the inspector
Nudge	Arrow keys (hold Shift for 1 m steps)
Pan / zoom	Right-drag to pan · scroll to zoom
Check rotation	Change Facing in the top toolbar to preview the placed heading
Export	Copy the Generated SQF on the right
Import	Expand Import an existing template, paste the entries, Load
Save / load project	Expand Save / load project (JSON)

Coordinate model

• The deploy pad sits at the origin [0, 0, 0]. +Y is front, +X is right.
• Each child is stored as ['Classname', [x, y, z], relativeDir].
• At spawn time the engine rotates the offset into world space with origin modelToWorld [x,y,z] and faces each object with setDir (originDir − relativeDir), so the whole compound rotates as one rigid body.
• Z is intentionally ignored for ground compositions (the common CreateDefenseTemplate helper flattens every object with _toWorld set [2,0]). The editor shows a Z field for completeness but marks it ⚠.

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Built-in presets

Besides the real WASP Barracks factory walls (included as a worked reference) and a blank canvas, WDDM ships the four engineer defense types, each in Light and Heavy weight and BLUFOR (WEST) / OPFOR (EAST) variants:

Type	Light — guns	Heavy — guns
AA Battery	WEST 2× Stinger · EAST ZU-23 + Igla	WEST 4× Stinger · EAST 2× ZU-23 + 2× Igla
Artillery Battery	2× howitzer (M119 / D-30)	4× howitzer
Weapons Emplacement	2× MG + 1× AT	4× MG + 2× AT + watchtower
Checkpoint	chicane + overwatch MG + guard tower	twin towers, 2× MG + 1× AT, hardened chicane

AI cost is cheap — one soldier per crewable weapon, no garrison. A position costs only its gun count: light AA/Arty = 2, light Emplacement = 3, light Checkpoint = 1; heavy 4 / 4 / 6 / 3. That crew comes out of the engineer's personal AI budget. HEAVY is gated behind the side's Barracks upgrade; limits are 2 positions per engineer and 1 per town, within 250 m of a friendly town centre — so you can dot cheap fortifications across the map.

Note: stock Arma 2 OA has no static bullet-AA for the US side, so the WEST AA battery uses Stinger (rocket) pods; OPFOR gets a true rocket + bullet mix (ZU-23 + Igla).

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How it works

WDDM is a single HTML file with three panels:

1. Build (left) — presets, the class palette, and the list of placed objects.
2. Canvas (centre) — an HTML5 <canvas> that draws each object in its own rotated local frame, so textures and footprints rotate correctly.
3. Inspector & Export (right) — per-object class/position/direction fields and the live SQF.

The output format is a single missionNamespace setVariable call holding an array of ['classname', [x,y,z], dir] tuples — the shape consumed by composition spawners like CreateDefenseTemplate in WASP-derived Warfare missions.

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Using the export in a mission

WDDM produces a named template variable, e.g.:

missionNamespace setVariable ['WFBE_NEURODEF_EMPLACEMENT_HEAVY_WEST',[
    ['M2StaticMG',[-8,3,0],0],
    ['M2StaticMG',[8,3,0],0],
    ['TOW_TriPod_US_EP1',[-5,5,0],0],
    // ...
]];

To spawn it, you need a composition helper that takes an origin object + the template array, places each child relative to the origin, and flattens to ground. The canonical WASP helper looks like this:

// CreateDefenseTemplate.sqf — [originObject, template] call ...
private ["_origin","_template","_dir","_created"];
_origin   = _this select 0;
_template = _this select 1;
_dir = getDir _origin;
_created = [];
{
    private ["_obj","_relPos","_relDir","_o","_world"];
    _obj = _x select 0; _relPos = _x select 1; _relDir = _x select 2;
    _o = createVehicle [_obj, [0,0,0], [], 0, "NONE"];
    _world = _origin modelToWorld _relPos;
    _world set [2, 0];
    _o setDir (_dir - _relDir);
    _o setPos _world;
    _created = _created + [_o];
} forEach _template;
_created

Then, anywhere you have a position + direction:

_helper = "Land_HelipadEmpty" createVehicle _pos;   // invisible origin
_helper setDir _dir;
_built  = [_helper, missionNamespace getVariable 'WFBE_NEURODEF_EMPLACEMENT_HEAVY_WEST'] call CreateDefenseTemplate;
deleteVehicle _helper;

Static weapons spawn empty; crew them with createUnit → moveInGunner if you want manned positions.

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Regenerating the banner

The social banner is rendered from docs/banner-source.html:

# serve the folder and screenshot docs/banner-source.html at 1280×640
python -m http.server 8000
# open http://localhost:8000/docs/banner-source.html and capture at 1280x640

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Credits & license

• Built for the Arma Warfare community.
• Visual identity (palette, logo, fonts) from Miksuu's Warfare — used here with permission.
• Developed with the help of Claude, Anthropic's AI assistant.
• Licensed under the MIT License — free to use, fork, and adapt.

Classnames in the presets reference Bohemia Interactive's Arma 2: Operation Arrowhead assets and are the property of their respective owners; WDDM ships no game content.