The adventures of a novice scenario maker.

[AdmiralHalsey]

Hello everyone. My name is Admiral Halsey and I have decided to share my experience of making a scenario for you guys here on the forums. As you can tell by the title i'm not exactly experienced when it comes to scenario making so forgive me if I do something that makes you want to shout "NO YOU IDIOT! YOU HAVE TO SCRIPT THE EVENT WITH IT SET TO THE BEGINNING OF THE YEAR NOT THE END!" Also I will only be doing small things until I get my footing. Well enough about that on to the first day of making the scenario.


Day 1. Choosing the map and other basic stuff.

My first order of business is to choose the map i'll use for the scenario. Seeing as it will be a WW2 map set in Germany I need to make sure that the focus in on Germany and the surrounding countries. I end up choosing the New Beginnings map as the base for the scenario. With that done I proceed to delete all the preexisting events and wipe the briefing clean. I then add two cities to the map, one is at the eastern end of Poland the other is near the southeast corner of France. The Polish one represents the gateway to the Eastern Front while the French one is the gateway to the African/Italian fronts. With that done I called it a day while beginning planning for tomorrow. I hope you enjoyed the post and I will update after working on the map tomorrow. Until the this is Admiral Halsey signing off.

[Blackhawk]

As an FYI - there is also the RT3 map creator where you can drag over an area and it will create a map of that area. It's not necessarily the perfect map but if you can't find a map that fits to your liking you can always try using the map creator.

[Hawk]

To add to what BH was talking about, the RT3 Map Builder is on disc 2, if you have the 2-cd version of RT3.
If not, you can find it on this page of the site:

http://hawkdawg.com/rrt/rrt3/Xtras/Tips_Tuts_Utils.htm

Scroll down to find the RT3 Map Builder link.

[Altoona+BeachCreek]

You should include the Deutsche Reichsbahn logo from the downloads page in the file with your map. Good luck with this project!

[AdmiralHalsey]

Blackhawk and Hawk. Thank you for the tips but I suck at map making which is why I chose a preexisting one.(If either of you two would like to make one though I would appreciate it.)

Altoona. Which logo pack is it in?

[Altoona+BeachCreek]

I don't remember, but I think most of them have a read-me file next to or included in the download page.

[Hawk]

Altoona. Which logo pack is it in?

It's in the Company Logos by Liesel.

[Wolverine@MSU]

Blackhawk and Hawk. Thank you for the tips but I suck at map making which is why I chose a preexisting one.(If either of you two would like to make one though I would appreciate it.)

The New Beginnings map is only 512 x 384. If you give me the approximate lat/long of the upper left (NW) and lower right (SE) corners and how big you want the map (number of map cells on longest side) I can pull a heightmap out of Microdem for you.

[AdmiralHalsey]

Sorry I haven't posted any updates lately. I've had to deal with a little thing called real life and it has kept me away from RRT3 the past couple of days. I should be able to update the Monday though so see ya then.

[AdmiralHalsey]

Well after not having any free time to work on the scenario at all for the past week and a half I was able to figure out a few things in regards to the story line and will give you guys a couple of tips. The most important one being that after WW1 it isn't worth the effort to build in a country that the Germany doesn't gains control of.(This excludes France as the moment WW2 starts any track you built there will be destroyed. However The Low countries are ok to build in.) The second tip is once the allied bombing raids on Berlin start heating up you can cross it off of your city list as all track, trains and stations in the Berlin area will be destroyed at the beginning of every month The last one is if you end the scenario in red that isn't necessarily a bad thing and depending on the choices you make it may even get you the gold.

[AdmiralHalsey]

Well I found some time to work on the map last night. I started writing some of the events that have to do with the air raids on Berlin and added a few hidden territories for some other air raids. I also added some fictional air raids that will hit random cities.(No I won't tell you which ones as that would ruin the surprise.) That's all I really had time for to do last night but I should be able to work on it some more later today.

[Altoona+BeachCreek]

Which map have you decided on?

[AdmiralHalsey]

Which map have you decided on?

The New Beginnings one. It only requires me to make Germany one territory and also add some cities to represent the Eastern Front and the African/Italian Front. It may be a smaller map but it'll do.

[AdmiralHalsey]

Well after trying out some Trainmaster i've come to a conclusion that will make this scenario take longer but should also make it better. I'm making it a Trainmaster scenario so i'll have to start from scratch

[Sugus]

[quote=""AdmiralHalsey"] I'm making it a Trainmaster scenario so i'll have to start from scratch[/quote]
... which means, that we poor idiots not being able to run TM have to dispense related to your great creation?

No, you're doing it the right way. Besides that I have all available TM maps in my private archives, I'm (due to not having the time to do so) not really experienced with TM. Nevertheless, I think, it's a good idea that you'll do that!

[AdmiralHalsey]

[quote=""AdmiralHalsey"] I'm making it a Trainmaster scenario so i'll have to start from scratch

... which means, that we poor idiots not being able to run TM have to dispense related to your great creation?

No, you're doing it the right way. Besides that I have all available TM maps in my private archives, I'm (due to not having the time to do so) not really experienced with TM. Nevertheless, I think, it's a good idea that you'll do that! [/quote]
Thanks for the encouragement. I was worried how the switch would be received. I'm going to go slow with this since i'm new to TM so updates will be more infrequent then before. I also need to make a new map, make sure I place the cities in the right spot, make sure the borders are right and so on. What I had hoped would be a year max will be a multi-year project but the effort will be worth it.

[AdmiralHalsey]

Well i'm thinking of doing something else with the scenario and i'll tell you what it is. I'm thinking of changing the music from bluegrass to classical stuff since the games music doesn't feel right outside of an American scenario.

[Gumboots]

German beer hall music. And change the department stores so they sell lederhosen.

[AdmiralHalsey]

German beer hall music. And change the department stores so they sell lederhosen.

Adding some beer hall music isn't a bad idea. That makes we wonder if the Chicken Dance would be considered that?

[Gumboots]

It'd be good if you could make it play Ride of the Valkryies during the bombing raids.

"I love the smell of Amatol in the morning"