Calling All Seasoned Terrain Gurus - Final Tweaking needed for Desert4

[+Piecemeal 450]

Hi guys.

 

Things are just about wrapped up here with Desert V4. I'm almost ready to upload it to the downloads section - but not before a few "minor" cosmetic changes are made:

 

 

 

 

Admittedly these errors are of my own making; I asked baffmeister to flatten the surfaces of these islands so that objects would sit more naturally on the surface. The result was the above pics. Other areas within the map such as new airfield sites and oversized mountains were perfectly levelled, but possibly the island issues happened because of the land/sea tiles.

If anyone could help out with this I'd be really grateful, as I'd rather not upload the terrain as is.

 

 

Oh yeah, one more question; does anybody know why every carrier based single mission has the convoy situated just off the Parani coast?

 

 

 

Any help with these issues would be appreciated.

[+baffmeister 1,205]

ooops!  I will take a look at that. Might have been an accidental mouse click when I was working on the terrain. Not sure if I still have the latest TFD and HFD files available. Could you post the current ones here?

[Wrench 9,848]

check the movement ini for the shipping routes (Gerwins tools is OUTSTANDING for this!!)

 

actually, for islands, I've found exporting the height map as bitmap, and the repainting their location to the blue sea color really helps when it comes to placing airbases on them. When flattened, they remain at 'sea level'. Of course, this assumes NO mountains on the island...

 

the tile misplace looks like an errant mouse click -- been there, done that!!!

[+Piecemeal 450]

Thanks for the quick reply lads.

 

Baffo; here you go. As requested:

 

HFD_and _TFD_Files.rar

 

The mod is based on the stock Desert terrain I've renamed them DESERT.HFD and DESERT.TFD just for your convenience.

 

 

Wrenchie boy! Long time no hear! Checking the Movement INI out now

[Centurion-1 1,228]

That is a 1,5 sec fix in Gerwins TFD tool (select proper coast tile. C to copy -> select errored tile -> paste -> rotate. Done)

 

BTW Looking forward to this terrain!

[+baffmeister 1,205]

Got the stray tiles fixed. There were quite a few, including the island in the middle of the ocean. I really don't know what happened to cause it but I guess it occured during the mountain removal process. I tried Wrenchs' idea of exporting the height map as a bit map and then painting the islands over with the sea color but couldn't get it to work. I think it may not except the change because the islands were previously leveled using the airfield leveling procedure, which doesn't work very well close to the water. Anyway, here are the new HFD and TFD files:

DesertTFD-HFDfixed.zip

[Wrench 9,848]

you should see the height bmp for the Norway map.....talk about mangled!!!

Look at the regions around Glasgow, Kiel, Oslo, Wilhelmshaven, the firths on the eastern UK. To say nothing of the fjords...

[+baffmeister 1,205]

Looks way nicer than the Desert height bmp! [did the terrain editor do the cut out near Glasgow all by itself?]

[+Piecemeal 450]

Got the stray tiles fixed. There were quite a few, including the island in the middle of the ocean. I really don't know what happened to cause it but I guess it occured during the mountain removal process. I tried Wrenchs' idea of exporting the height map as a bit map and then painting the islands over with the sea color but couldn't get it to work. I think it may not except the change because the islands were previously leveled using the airfield leveling procedure, which doesn't work very well close to the water. Anyway, here are the new HFD and TFD files:

 

Great stuff baffmeister. The islands are back to looking like their old selves once more. I owe you one

 

Wrench - correct me if I'm wrong, but with a _WATER.bmp in a navalised terrain, then there's no need for shipping routes in the MOVEMENT.ini?

I have a terrain specific WATER.bmp and shipping routes in the MOVEMENT.ini

 

Water.bmp :

[Wrench 9,848]

no, you absolutely NEED the shipping routes!! Otherwise, you'll won't have any auntie-ship missions

the 'naval zones' are only for allowing the game engine to  generate carrier and surface action battle groups

 

baff: no, that was me in photoshop!  Had to do that to make sure the terrain was flat(ish) for the river. I tried 4 times to get the Great Glen in, but just couldn't quite get it right. Pity. I really wanted Loch Ness in there (even if no 3d guy made Nessie for me)  Did the same a Stornawy (sp?), too

Sometimes you have to sacrifice geophysical reality for how the damn tile system works

[+baffmeister 1,205]

baff: no, that was me in photoshop!  Had to do that to make sure the terrain was flat(ish) for the river. I tried 4 times to get the Great Glen in, but just couldn't quite get it right. Pity. I really wanted Loch Ness in there (even if no 3d guy made Nessie for me)  Did the same a Stornawy (sp?), too

Sometimes you have to sacrifice geophysical reality for how the damn tile system works

 

I said it before and will say it again in a different way......Beaucoup Travail!.......................Geeeeez!

[Stratos 3,191]

I'm really looking forward to this terrain, as is the setting I fly the more. So my hats off for all you guys!