Benelux terrain Add In

[VonBeerhofen 63]

Once in a blue moon the EAW Launchpad changes it's online game to keep players interested and flying. This time I decided that the recent Blood moon was a good opportunity for a new enhancement on our BENELUX terrain set by incorporating a random selection of my 600+ Harvest tiles. These are all 8 bit versions of normal 256 x 256 pixel drawings to maintain the highest possible frame rates for our missions. It's a bit of an experiment and depending on demand the selection may change in the future.

Here's a few screenies which I hope our readers will like. More screen shots of our missions will also regularly appear on my website https://rabartel.home.xs4all.nl/ 

You heard it first on combatace.com!

VonBeerhofen

EAW Launchpad janitor

 

[VonBeerhofen 63]

Updated pictures with a few recently created new tiles.

VBH

[VonBeerhofen 63]

New pictures with new tiles showing the use of "BREAKER" tiles. These are tiles with not much on them and as such easy and less time consuming to create. They open up the crowded areas, which are obviously not everywhere as populated as some pictures suggest. So by replacing one or two 'crowded' tiles a bit more open space is generated. Of course such tiles can also function as a standalone nature and create a more desolate looking terrain. All tiles initially start out as a 'breaker' in Photoshop and allow them to be easily changed at will by moving, rotating, adding or subtracting layers, the one's shown here are new and will be turned into more populated versions at a later stage, the pictures were made for determining how the transitions to adjacent tiles work and to get an idea on how they can best be used.

I also found this picture, on old gem from the past when I created the sky for Moggy's Dunkirk and had just begun investigating how to best create these tiles. Sadly I lost my border set which also provided the ground's irregularities background on top of which everything else was drawn so I reverted to using borders from previously created tiles instead to keep border colors as identical as possible, this to get as little seams as possible. To be honest they're not as precise as when I started as I had to make minimal changes for each new tile and those changes accumulated over time due to the new process I started using. Notice the alternative coastline and glasshouses I tried to mimic in my first attempts. I was very happy with the coastline as it contains the connecting road of the Atlantic Wall which ran from Spain all the way to the North of Holland, part of which is still present in my village, as are some coastal defenses.



P.S. of course the lake color was later changed after I saw the result in this picture, in game things can look very different due to the ambient lighting, you learn as you go.

VonBeerhofen

[VonBeerhofen 63]

A new tile type in EAWPRO, the Spacer. No it's not about flying into space as in MAW but it's a set of tiles which will add a bit more rest to the Harvest terrain if desired. Some people who've been following this thread may think that it's the same as a Breaker tile and in a way it is but there's a significant difference. The Breaker tiles don't come as a set and have signs of cultivation or habitation, whereas a Spacer set doesn't and can be used as standalone or replace an entire nature, like for instance a forest or a mountain or grass set. You could fill an entire island with it and give it the impression of being uninhabited.

You can see one of these in a group of 4 behind the left wing of this Me110, directly left of it's tail.

4 or 5 more are under development so stock tile arrangements can simply be copied into this terrain when required to quickly adapt visuals in our on line missions in the EAW Launchpad.

VonBeerhofen

(EAW Launchpad Janitor)

[VonBeerhofen 63]

Here's 4 tiles in the set in a mountain configuration, which in stock EAW also happens to contain a set of 4. Notice that these tiles have not been randomized yet so this is how it would also look in stock EAW. These tiles can be used in any configuration or order as they're not subject to stock EAW border transitions, which limits a tile's use, but will fit anywhere, even in an EAWPRO City. Another tile is still under development as an extra spare, after all it's never enough!

VonBeerhofen

[VonBeerhofen 63]

And here's the SPARE tile replacing the center tile in the previous pictures. Obviously it can occupy ANY of the previous tiles or be used with any other  set or as standalone and as such will significantly change the layout of the terrain.

Talking about SPARES, there are some 600+ in the Harvest Set and new tiles are still being created.

VonBeerhofen

 

[VonBeerhofen 63]

A 6th tile was added to this set, so it can be used to replace ANY nature group in EAWPRO.

Here the set is temporarily replacing the entire forest set in the Ardennes to test it out:

Of course any shown graphics may be subject to change in future updates, these are merely basic designs.

VonBeerhofen

[VonBeerhofen 63]

A new field tile(Nr.475 so a bit of a jubilee version):

VonBeerhofen 

[VonBeerhofen 63]

Bonus tile GRASS. Here visible as two mirrored and slightly different versions, mainly to test the effect of larger areas with one nature and the long and winding road, which will come in handy in my Italy addon.

VonBeerhofen

[VonBeerhofen 63]

Another experiment with connecting orchards on two tile corners. Notice how various tile rotations create various shapes when two or more orchard drawings connect. Nothing new really but fun to experiment with. Made a minor mistake though by putting the two orchards on a single side of the tile, I think it's better when the sides are opposite of each other, less in line. I'll rectify that later. Of course these two orchards can be on separate tiles too but this one fits the agricultural division of the terrain in EAWPRO better and it's less work too, :)

VonBeerhofen