Order of map creation

[edbangor]

As I'm currently building a new map on which I plan to base several scenarios (hope that's okay?) I wondered if people have formula for making maps from scratch, especially fantasy ones.
It's been a few years since I did one so I had to work out what I thought would be a logical way to do it which I'll put below but bare in mind that this isn't set in stone, and I will often return to one of the older phases to clean something up and/or just make changes on whim.

Anyway here's what I worked out as the order for "the Hub":

(1) Starting with an all green map, place oceans to carve out the land masses which will become the territories.
(2) Next, becuase "the hub" will have distinct territories, with different land types, I put those in, and gave each one a slight colour wash, to make them easier to spot when zooming in, to place what follows.
(3) Hills mountains, pits and other changes in land height came next.
(4) Lakes followed at various heights to allow for rivers to flow in logical dirrections (ie downhill mostly towards the ocean or other lower level lakes)
(5) Rivers were obviously next. (some rivers were placed using the ocean tool to drop the land height to '0' and creating a cutting, or valley, gorge effect,)
(6) 'proper' land painting followed. (this is the thing that will get touched up more than anything else)
(7) Trees, rocks and other ground debris
(8) Regions were painted in, and their industries seeded.
(9) Finally cities were placed, in what would appear to be logical places (on rivers, at the coast, beside lakes, foot and/or top of hills etc) and seeded on variables of the region they were in. (ie it was 'copied from city' and then played with).

And that's where I've got to so far. The result will become the seed map for the scenarios which will each have their own events, 'special conditons' etc and will be worked on seperately.
How does that compare to what anyone else does (or do you just make it up as you go along as I did with Edland!)

[Sugus]

From my point of view, that's the "natural" order to do it. And, I think, I followed it without further reflections when I created my (small) maps at the beginning of this year.

[Grandma Ruth]

The only thing I'll say - before Hawk does - is that I would leave the actual final painting till last, as you can sometimes lose colour with multiple saves and you'll naturally be saving your map over and over again as you tweak. Just my

[edbangor]

The only thing I'll say - before Hawk does - is that I would leave the actual final painting till last, as you can sometimes lose colour with multiple saves and you'll naturally be saving your map over and over again as you tweak. Just my

Yes, I read hawk's thread on that, but can't say it's something I've ever noticed.
Perhaps my 'painting' isn't detailed enough.

[nedfumpkin]

It really depends on the type of painting since the image is compressed like a jpg image is. So if you have a flat green colour across the map you won't notice the degradation, whereas if you are using mottled effects or putting sand on beaches it becomes noticeable.

Personally, painting the map is always the last thing I do.

[OilCan]

I've made three maps in the last few months, two of which I've taken all the way to test trials. I need to make some final tweaks on one of them and it will be ready for beta testing.

Here's the order of map making that I followed (saving the map with a new name between each step).

(1) Begin with a heightmap. Find the combination of overall land height, mountain height and smoothing modifiers which best depict the terrain for the game story.
(2)Use paint bucket to create elevation contours or gradients of the map. Start at either the highest point or the lowest point of the map and make at least 5-6 colored gradients, - more the better. This will be painted over later.
(3) Change/smooth elevation to suit the game story. Deepen or widen river valleys. Remove unrealistic sharp peaks of high mountains. Smooth intended paths of train routes. Smooth area for stations in big cities. Finer smoothing comes later after first trial run.
(4) Add in the lakes. Make these as final as possible.
(5) Add in the rivers. Follow the valleys shown by the elevation gradients. Make these as final as possible.
(6) Rough in the vegetation, set densities to low-mod for this first pass. Vary vegetation by elevation.
(7) Draw in the major territories. Minor or special territories added in step (9).
(8) Place the cities. Create template cities to help pre-load each new city with industries.
Set default game year in editor (General page). Set up industry mix for each city.
(Arop also adds track and stations at this point to ensure the track route and station areas are reasonably sloped, which is not a bad idea.)
(9) Create the minor or special territories.
Use some test events to make sure special territories are of sufficient size and location.
(10) Create the regions. Set up industry mix and building densities for each region. Run a test game for 5 years to check demands and supplies.
Set up the recipies for ports and warehouses.
(11) Use paint bucket to 'reset' the entire map color to a new base color. Rough in the intended map colors. No fine or spot work yet.
(12) Hand place industry, ports, warehouses & other buildings, AI tracks/stations or any other such features on the map. Add any labels to the map.
(13) Enter events and dialog text. Test. Run trial runs. Fine tune the territories, regions and cities after each test run.
Smooth map and add vegetation as needed after each test run.
(14) Do the final coloring on the map and add final vegetation.

It's now ready for the beta test!

I create a master game (i.e. Indian rails_master) but also create new maps for each step (i.e. indian rails_territories). I update the master after finishing each step.

[edbangor]

Thanks Oilcan for the guide to do create a map from a heightmap, as I only work from scratch

It's been a while since I wrote the original message of this back when I was making what would be my second map for RRT3 after a rather long break. Since then I've done another five albeit mostly for Train Master and things have changed most noticeably, that I don't paint (at all) until the very end, when the entire thing is finished. In the meantime, the map stays green. I also add hills a lot earlier.
Anyway: here's the updated version.

(1) Starting with an all green screen, now instead of placing oceans first, I will first place labels around the map of where the main parts/regions/cities of the scenario are going to be, and then raise/lower the ground level as needed depending on the scenario's plot / goals.
(2) Now comes what used to be the first and oceans are put in to carve out the land mass/es, islands, as well as territories.
(3) Another new one, in that I'll use the ocean tool to create the valleys, cut outs, gorges and so on that I like on my maps, (these are later painted over with the land tool.)
(4) Inland lakes are also added, here, but these will tend to be done with the ocean tool rather than the lake one unless they need to be higher or lower for some reason, (a personal preference in that oceans are easier to paint!)
(5) Now the proper land mass is finished off ensuring that nothing is too steep, and there's still access to wherever the trains/tracks need to get.
(6) It is only now that territories get added in followed by...
(7) Cities (although at this stage I only name the main ones as the rest will be added later but that's as I'm not great at thinking names up so do that slowly)
(8) Regions are next (this could be done earlier in RRT3 but given the complex nature of TM, the regions need to be balanced around the cities.

--play testing will now take place to check the spawning/placing of resources/industries are working, along with all the fiddling that takes place during that including several basic green washes to correct the water erosion caused by multiple saves.
Once satisfied with that the scenario itself will be worked on with the events, texts etc, and only when the scenario is ready do I move on to...--

(9) Rivers are added. (some rivers could be added earlier if relevant to the scenario!)
(10) The final painting is done.

--another play test/s--

(11) At this stage the map is done so the extras are added, trees, rocks and other ground debris plus touching up the painting. I may also remove any land that is no longer needed for the scenario (i.e. turn it to ocean).

During all of this I tend to work in a Window so I can have the text 'read me' file open onto which notes are made, and the plotline - usually previous written - is worked on and can be compared to the actual game. Test plays are done in full screen with a note pad (you know the old paper kind) to take notes of what needs to be changed when back in the editor.
And there you have it…

[OilCan]

I see....you start with a solid, flat land mass and add the water bodies. And, then you create mountains, hills and slopes with the elevation tool. That's not a bad way to do it. I'd think that would keep most surfaces smooth (no small dimples and bumps). I can see the advantages to that.

I've use the microsoft Paint to create some maps (red for oceans and lakes, black for sea level, blues for elevations), saved them as a .bmp then converted the .bmp to a .tga with a free download called WSQ Viewer. Then bring the .tga in as the height map. I've also used the MapBuilder program and it works fairly well for real world maps - but MapBuilder gives you the dimples and bumps because it is working with real elevations.

After I get these RT3 maps done, I'd like to get over into the trainmaster side and get familiar with that super mod.

[edbangor]

I see....you start with a solid, flat land mass and add the water bodies. And, then you create mountains, hills and slopes with the elevation tool. That's not a bad way to do it. I'd think that would keep most surfaces smooth (no small dimples and bumps). I can see the advantages to that.

If you are using a lot of spawning industries, mines, farms, etc, it's important to keep the ground as flat as possible, as the game won't put flatten the land to make space when spawning, even if it would do when you placed something by hand. Thankfully, the Smooth Area option in the elevation tool is great for clearing that out.

After I get these RT3 maps done, I'd like to get over into the trainmaster side and get familiar with that super mod.

Please do, I'm sure you'll love the extra challanges that TM has added to the original game.
Put it this way, since trying out TM, I've yet to go back to 'regular' RRT3.

[nedfumpkin]

Oilcan, I do hope you'll bring your manual with you when you check out TM in the hopes that some day in the future it can be adapted.

And part of the reason TM is so fun has to do with the mpas the edbanger is manking...really fun play.