This thread is where I will be keeping you up to date with what kind of things we require on the subject of the Custom Battlemaps. Below is a list of different types of Custom Battlemaps that we request to be made for the mod, these might be standard maps for certain regions or cultures, or specific maps for certain settlements. When a request has been fulfilled, there will be a "Done! " behind it in the checklist. You will still be free to try to better any finished requests, but we prefer if you would focus on fulfilling any open requests first.
Of course, you need to have access to the mod files first before you can do anything, to apply for the position of Custom Battlemap Maker, please go to this thread for the details: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=550808
Lastly, if you have any questions about the requests above or the Custom Battlemaps Project in general, please feel free to post them here or send me a PM.
Cheers,
Landil, Historical Settlements Project Leader for Dominion of the Sword
Mod Leader, Head of Research & Middle East Specialist
Re: Announcement: the Historical Settlements Project and more!
Out of curiosity, are you guys using all of the settlements previously made or is this starting from scratch, all over again?
The whole modern world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives. The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of the Conservatives is to prevent the mistakes from being corrected. - G.K. CHESTERTON
Re: Announcement: the Historical Settlements Project and more!
I'm not the expert on the technicalities of the custom battlemaps, that would be Resurrection, but as far as I know, it's from scratch. I could be wrong, but I believe previously the custom battlemaps were made outside of the game files and therefore cannot be implemented into the campaign map, which is why we are giving mapmakers access to the mod folder so can make and implement the maps directly into the game.
Mod Leader, Head of Research & Middle East Specialist
Re: Announcement: the Historical Settlements Project and more!
Hm, wasn't the issue that settlement maps are tied to culture and settlement level (in that you could have culture * number of settlement levels * 2 (castle/city distinction) of unique settlement plans) and thus all the custom maps that were made for cities that are represented in DotS as settlements (instead of PSFs) could not be used?
From my admittedly limited understanding, the battle maps for PSFs can be manually set in the descr_strat, so as long as the file is in the right folder it should work. Of course, there could be issues I'm not aware of.
Re: Announcement: the Historical Settlements Project and more!
Okay, I will likely take a shot at making a few of these. I am very interested in doing the Acrocorinth; that is, if it is a PSF. I don't have much experience making maps, and all of my RTW ones have been pretty laughable. That being said, I am sure that with enough time I will be able to tackle this project. I will need to find some time and I may begin late next week.
Now, if I understood correctly, I will have to download the entire mod? I am almost a bit hesitant to do so, in fear or ruining the surprise. But for the good of the final product I shall do what is necessary.
EDIT: I also committed to helping out with the contemporary art unit cards. I fear that will be a bit much for me but we will see. As of now I have a paper to write and a test following the weekend so that is my primary concern.
I realize this isn't a PSF so it may not be possible.
Last edited by atheniandp; July 21, 2012 at 12:20 AM.
The whole modern world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives. The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of the Conservatives is to prevent the mistakes from being corrected. - G.K. CHESTERTON
I'm glad this project has gotten off the ground, this will be quite amazing!
I was just thinking about an iconic structure present all throughout Central Europe: fortified churches.
From wiki: "A fortified church is a church built to play a defensive role in time of war. Some churches were specially designed to incorporate military features, such as thick walls and narrow, defensive windows. For example, the Cathedral of Ávila was incorporated into the city wall. Monastic communities, such as Lérins Abbey, are often surrounded by a wall, and sometimes churches have an outer wall, such as St Arbogast, Muttenz, Switzerland. High concentration of fortified churches can be found in parts of Europe where there was a lot of hand-to-hand warfare, for example in the Dordogne region of France, which was fought over by France and England in medieval times, and in Transylvania, which was the scene of Ottoman invasions."
The building of fortified churches was a common practice in frontier regions. The earliest example of a fortified church is a Polish church built between 1079–1098. Note: it was the only structure in Krakow that could withstand the Mongol invasion of 1241: I'd say that's a prime example of how such a building can be effective.
In Transylvania, more than 150 fortified churches exist to this day, most of them being built between the 12th and the 16th century A.D. The only improvements made to the already existing Churches in the medieval ages by the 16th century was the addition of thicker walls, so that the structure could withstand canon-fire.
Such structures as you can clearly see were present throughout Europe. Most of these structures were built by the predominantly Germans, which was then adopted by many of the natives such as the Szeklers in Transylvania.
If we examine a typical fortified church in Transylvania, and compare such a structure with a fortified church in Switzerland for example, we can see that (speaking from a strictly architectural viewpoint) they are quite similar:
Example of a Transylvanian church:
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
And now a Swiss one:
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
As you can clearly see they are strikingly familiar.
Since our policy of adding PSFs doesn't allow the placement of such buildings as PSFs, a model designed to represent fortified churches could be used to represent in-game structures on the battlefield.
Therefore we could use an already existing battlemap, and simply add a fortified church and a few dwellings to represent a small village surrounding the church. The gained church textures could be used
throughout Europe, in Switzerland, Transylvania, in certain regions of France and even Germany. Naturally the surrounding houses should differ as the architectural style of a common Hungarian, French,
German and Swiss dwelling are far from close.
The following images are designed by an extremely talented Romanian graphical artist who reconstructed the fortified churches of Transylvania:
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
As for specific PSF battlemaps, here is the castle of Nógrádvár:
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
A panorama of how Esztergom looked in the middle ages:
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
The castle of Diósgyőr:
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
XII century:
13th century:
Buda:
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
Visegrád:
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
Also here is reconstruction of a typical earthen fortification present throughout Poland, the 'Rus states and Hungary in the early
middle ages that we could use for PSFs on the steppe, Poland and Hungary which have a 'Wooden castle' model:
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
If needed I can supply you with hundreds of period accurate pictures that we could use to model the actual fortification
including the evolution of the fortification, examination of how the castle looked from above, illustrations and other useful
data.
Example:
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
Diósgyőr castle:
12 century A.D
13th century A.D
In detail description of the castle grounds:
Last edited by Diodredai; July 22, 2012 at 08:50 AM.
Excellent suggestions, Diodredai. Would these models be made with the IWTE tool?
Also, have any custom models already been made for walls, fortifications, buildings and the sort? I am very determined to work on some of these forts. I am currently practising designing these battle maps on the vanilla game and some mods.
One thing that strikes me as peculiar is the inability to position walls at will. All of the walls are already pre defined in the settlement/fort models. They are inalienable from the rest. If I speak correctly, this will make for some pretty generic fortresses, with only a few models, terrain and geography distinguishing each PSF.
The whole modern world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives. The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of the Conservatives is to prevent the mistakes from being corrected. - G.K. CHESTERTON
1) I think, yes. But I don't have a smattering of this.
2) I don't know, if there would be any custom building. Anyway, it is possible.
3) I you are intrested in it, we currently have ground plans, drawings, and 3D recontruction for about 40-50 castles.
I have some good news. I just spent a few hours in the M2TW battle editor (playing through Bellum Crucis) and I have managed to make a pretty impressive-- if I do say so myself-- landscape of the Acrocorinth and Corinth. Unfortunately my screenshots did not turning out, but I'll post some once I install fraps. Before I officially join the team I'd just like to become more familiar with how the editor works (I'd like test the map, etc). I realize I will have to meet a high standard of quality for Dominion of the Sword so I will dedicate the next few days in perfecting these skills.
The whole modern world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives. The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of the Conservatives is to prevent the mistakes from being corrected. - G.K. CHESTERTON
Custom Battlemaps: requests and tasklist
" behind it in the checklist. You will still be free to try to better any finished requests, but we prefer if you would focus on fulfilling any open requests first.
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Re: Announcement: the Historical Settlements Project and more!
