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How To Use MapGen

Posted: 09 Apr 2018 11:48
by Pacific RailRoad
If you can read , you propably saw the title , How to use the MapGen?

Re: How To Use MapGen

Posted: 10 Apr 2018 07:11
by Owen-Alexander
Which part of map gen are you looking for help on?

Creating the landscape to use in the game should be in the map gen thread.

If you are looking for help in making the image to make into a map, then I can give you some pointers on that.

First, you will need a paint like program (originally, scracc (sim city region and city creator) but that has been lost to time). I would recommend HME (Height Map Editor) from here. I recommend this one because you can set custom map sizes (like the 386x386 needed for lomo maps).

Second, you'll need a steady hand and patience. Start off simple, then go to more complex designs.

Hope any of this has been helpful. I potter around the forums most days, so if you need more help just drop a pm my way.

Just to help you out, I'll include the height charts that I put together. For reference, in the png height chart, the locomotion heights are on the left, while the heights to use in hme are on the right (sorry the notation on it is a bit messy but it shouldn't be hard to understand.

Oh, If your interested in a map (atleast to test with), I have a map here. Nothing too fancy, but hopefully helpful.

Re: How To Use MapGen

Posted: 10 Apr 2018 12:49
by Pacific RailRoad
Alright! Thank for your help , I'll try fiddling with it.


also can you give me a list of terrain ground code? like which number stand for grass and stuff.

Re: How To Use MapGen

Posted: 11 Apr 2018 00:27
by Owen-Alexander
Ok, The main numbers are in mapgen itself. 3 for rock (the grey rock), 4 for desert (so sand, it means sand) and 130 for grass (the green kind). These are the most commonly used terrain tiles, so that's why they're documented (other numbers might work, but could crash your game on load up, so stick to the three known numbers).

Hopefully I'm not overloading you info but here is some more for making sure you got the right idea. Mapgen asks for a .bmp file first (for the landscape), then a region (A = Alpine, N = North America, B = Britain, or C) C is a custom region (never used it, and from what I've seen of your screenshots, N works best for you), then it asks for a water level (I set mine to 4, so four vertical tiles up water is created, it also depends on the landscape), lastly it asks for the terrain/ground type (which you asked about). And bam, map is done ready for fine tuning in the locomotion landscape editor.

Re: How To Use MapGen

Posted: 11 Apr 2018 05:56
by Pacific RailRoad
how do I make that the map is like not over 30 tall , because every time I select an image (let's say a map of Indochina , Germany , Siberia , etc) everything just goes over 30 tiles high , and how do I make that one part of the terrain is shorter than the other one (HME doesn't seem to load any of my BMP so I don't have a clue of what to do).

Re: How To Use MapGen

Posted: 11 Apr 2018 06:28
by Owen-Alexander
Hmm, can't say that used a greyscale map of an actual area. All the maps I've built (no pun intended) from the ground up. The first thing that comes to mind, is to darken the image file so that it is put through mapgen as lower. Photoshop can help with that, not sure of any other programs that can do it.

HME asks for .hmp (height map file it creates) and .bmp files. Not sure why it wont load yours (Could you send the file to me and i'll have a look at it).

What do you mean by 'shorter'? Do you mean lower or are you asking if one side of the map can shorter than the other.

Re: How To Use MapGen

Posted: 11 Apr 2018 11:27
by Pacific RailRoad
This , and I do mean lower sorry.

The BMP https://www.sendspace.com/file/hbxa2r (Somehow it doesn't allow me to upload BMP here)

Re: How To Use MapGen

Posted: 12 Apr 2018 00:35
by Owen-Alexander
Ok, had a look at the image, and could see straight away what the major issue was.

The image was cut out of another map right? (probably the reason it wasn't loading HME as well).

My suggestion for getting back on track is recreating the map in HME. The map you have lacks any height information, so if it was working properly the map would be flat any way.

Mapgen works on greyscale, Solid black (or 0 in HME) is the absolute bottom of the map (to where you can't lower it anymore), while solid white (or 255 in HME) will give you the maximum height in lomo (234 is what I have documented as lomos height limit in HME, fyi).

TLDR; HME likes greyscale images to work with (you can set it to greyscale by right clicking the map/work area and selecting "Grey Shades" in the menu that pops up. If you really want exact maps, look online for greyscale topographic maps (obviously of the area you are trying to create), that's your best bet for that.

Probably not the best advise here, but try searching the "Scenario and Savegame" locomotion section for greyscale as others have converted maps and may have info that you can use. Same can be said for this section, as if I recall correctly, mapgen was released early on in locomotion's life and good advice might be buried at the tail end of these sections.

Re: How To Use MapGen

Posted: 12 Apr 2018 05:30
by Pacific RailRoad
first , yes it was cut.

second , I don't quite understand what you're saying , can you be more detail about it?.

Re: How To Use MapGen

Posted: 12 Apr 2018 06:05
by Owen-Alexander
OK, The map you have (the one posted earlier) won't work for making locomotion landscapes. My suggestion is that (because, at least in my opinion) you try and copy that coast line of your map in HME.

That way you get a map that will work better in mapgen, and not have words or other artefacts in the image/map.

In regards to lowering the height, my tip/advice is darken the image to lower it, so it shows up lower in the game.

Re: How To Use MapGen

Posted: 12 Apr 2018 12:12
by Pacific RailRoad
When I loaded the Base that you send me , HME just crash on me for some reason.

Re: How To Use MapGen

Posted: 13 Apr 2018 01:00
by Owen-Alexander
Well, that is worrying. I was able to reload it in mine fine. Not sure why it would crash, did you (after it crashed) try and reload the image in HME, and did it crash again?.

Also I didn't mean for you to put it HME, more on putting it in mapgen to see (using parameters set by you) how the looks in game as (and what you should be creating in HME. But looking at it in HME isn't a bad idea, as you get to see the height values in HME, then what it looks like in locomotion.

At this point I'm not going to be of much practical help (as I can't see what you are seeing in regards to what's happening with HME and the crashes). I'll try and help if needed, but it's more thing of making the maps by hand (I never used an existing map, all mine are custom).