Map editors

[Ludicus]

.
Now what the hell are these parts isn't immediately apparent, but if these are the big unknowns then we'll have ETW China mod before Christmas

Unfortunately I can only wish I had that kind of free time

more likely a bunch of minimods extracted from my personal use

I hope my work will be useful to everyone who makes mods,

( some say a smile is worth a thousand words)

[Robertclive]

what breakthrough, what the hell happened

[alhoon]

what breakthrough, what the hell happened

Patience...

TAW is making fast progress in finding out how the hell the map works and he may even find a way to release a map editor at some point, or at least instructions for people to follow.

He also released a bunch of useful tables, enabling access to many locked parts. Like the diplomacy tables.

[King Sama]

This is quite amazing! Please keep up your work TAW, you could single-handedly open up ETW modding to the levels seen in RTW or M2TW.

[SigniferOne]

( some say a smile is worth a thousand words)

That's a picture

[Ludicus]

That's a picture

You got me

[Irishguy]

TAW hasn't anwsered for a while is this still going on?

[taw]

TAW hasn't anwsered for a while is this still going on?

I'm on holidays right now.

[Croshy]

yep mate, and you so much deserve them ... i wish you a nice chill-out!

[Primergy]

A little thing, i recognized during my renaming procedure, were i think it could be worth a little research:

In the region_tables, you will also find some RGB values.

I had a quick look and recognized that those values in this table are fitting with the RGB values of the regions in the xyz_lookup.tga (look in my attachment).
Its also interesting that the mode of this tga isn't a simple RGB or Greyscale one, but an indexed Color with 8bit/channel.

My guess would be that this is used to render the regions on the minimap but it could be also possible that this is used to determine the Region Borders of the "movement Map), since the region_border_splines aren't used for this.


Made a quick test:

Those two files are definitly used for telling the engine were the region borders are on the Minimap. I enlarged a region and it resulted in a enlarged region in the campaign menue.

(part deleted since it was confirmed)

[taw]

Minimap with "colors" being clickable indexes is a very common technique in games.
I think they used it also for rtw/m2tw, and older modders if they can recognize it.

A little thing, i recognized during my renaming procedure, were i think it could be worth a little research:

In the region_tables, you will also find some RGB values.

I had a quick look and recognized that those values in this table are fitting with the RGB values of the regions in the xyz_lookup.tga (look in my attachment).
Its also interesting that the mode of this tga isn't a simple RGB or Greyscale one, but an indexed Color with 8bit/channel.

My guess would be that this is used to render the regions on the minimap but it could be also possible that this is used to determine the Region Borders of the "movement Map), since the region_border_splines aren't used for this.


Made a quick test:

Those two files are definitly used for telling the engine were the region borders are on the Minimap. I enlarged a region and it resulted in a enlarged region in the campaign menue.

The Problem is, that when i want to start a campaign the game crashes somewhere at the half.

Personally spoken, i doubt that the game would crash if this would be a pure visual thing...

[Cursisanafou]

It's probably just a visual thing.. but at the same time needs to add up to everything else in the file system.

So I could see it possible that that is one thing that also needs to be changed when you create regions.

[alhoon]

Minimap with "colors" being clickable indexes is a very common technique in games.
I think they used it also for rtw/m2tw, and older modders if they can recognize it.

Exactly. Back in M2TW we could add regions by adding a uniquely colored area in the map, with a city and then edit the text files controlling the "transition" from tga's to maps to tell the engine the "name" of the region and the settlement (not necessarily the ones you see in the map) that the script and the engine uses.

[The Hedge Knight]

A little thing, i recognized during my renaming procedure, were i think it could be worth a little research:

In the region_tables, you will also find some RGB values.

I had a quick look and recognized that those values in this table are fitting with the RGB values of the regions in the xyz_lookup.tga (look in my attachment).
Its also interesting that the mode of this tga isn't a simple RGB or Greyscale one, but an indexed Color with 8bit/channel.

My guess would be that this is used to render the regions on the minimap but it could be also possible that this is used to determine the Region Borders of the "movement Map), since the region_border_splines aren't used for this.


Made a quick test:

Those two files are definitly used for telling the engine were the region borders are on the Minimap. I enlarged a region and it resulted in a enlarged region in the campaign menue.

The Problem is, that when i want to start a campaign the game crashes somewhere at the half.

Personally spoken, i doubt that the game would crash if this would be a pure visual thing...

Only affects the minimaps, have done this for napoleon without it crashing.

[Primergy]

Only affects the minimaps, have done this for napoleon without it crashing.

Thanks for the input, also thought it's more a visual thing, but was rather surprised as it kept crashing.

[hellfire15]

the 27th was some time ago, any updates on this?

[Captain Jack Aubrey]

i dont know wetherthis ha been discovered, probably as dueto everyones exxcellent work but heret is anyway

when modifing the localsiation file i discovered this not very handy but interesting
regions_onscreen_china Empire of China

[hellfire15]

I don't know wheter this has already been discovered, probably ss due to everyones excellent work but here it is anyway

When modifing the localisation file I discovered this, not very handy but interesting.
regions_onscreen_china Empire of China

^fixed up the grammar a bit.

[taw]

the 27th was some time ago, any updates on this?

Well, the latest update is that groupformations converter is working just fine on Windows with JRuby.

Basically, if you're using Windows, use JRuby for all my programs. Normal Ruby differs
too much from system to system, and between 32 bit and 64 bit version, so I'll ignore that
unnecessary complexity and target JRuby from now on.

I'll message everyone once I port esf converter to JRuby and Windows as well.

[Flavious]

Taw,

First of all, thank you for this epoch-making work to enable new levels of ETW modding.

Most of the discussion here is revolving around campaign maps -- and that's great -- but I also want to make a plea for you to help us with just one thing that would make a huge difference to battle maps.

We have a lot of new custom battle maps for ETW that people (including me) have created. But one big thing we still can't do is add fences and walls to custom battle maps. Primergy mentioned this early in the thread, when he asked you how the system of farm.farm_manager, farm_template_tile, esf, etc., works. I posted a discussion thread ( http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=380387 ) with some screenshots when I used esf editor to look inside farm.farm_manager.

Since I'm a just a mapper and have absolutely no tech knowledge of hex editing, esf files, or any of that stuff, what we're looking for is someone give us a "for dummies" procedure to understand how these files control walls and fences on maps, what the various settings do to make certain walls/fences appear in certain places, and (most importantly) how to edit these setting for a custom map.

I've got an accurate and scaled custom map of Gettysburg Day 2 all finished for the Blue & Gray mod right now -- all it lacks are those walls and fences. Ditto for the maps I've made for Port Republic (Civil War), White Plains (American Revolution), and Guilford Courthouse (American Revolution).

And by the way: For those who were wondering how to get heightmap data (like the stuff you can download from the US Geological Survey) into .raw format for custom maps, here's a link to a great tutorial that I've used for all my maps. You'll need a number of free or shareware tools to do the multiple conversions, but it's really not hard once you walk through it. And the results are jaw-dropping when you can see real topography in-game:

http://www.christianhart.de/bb/blitz...BlitzTiles.pdf