4. EDITING THE MAP
In my opinion, editing the map is one of the most complicated things you can do as a modder. In theory, there shouldn't be anything to worry about. Just a couple of changes in
province.bmp and you're done. The problem is that the smallest mistake can cause a crash. Anyone who has a share of bad luck (such as me) is bound to spend a lot of time banging his/her head against the wall. I hope this guide will save a few brain cells.
UNDERSTANDING POSITIONS
Map objects are located by a file called
positions.txt. Their positions are given in pixels. The values on the y axis are inverted, which means that they're counted from the bottom of the map instead of the top. I'll give you a quick walk-through on how to change the position of an object.
- Open province.bmp and turn it upside down (to compensate for the inverted y axis)
- Hold the pointer over the location where you want to put your map object
- Note the values in the status bar
- Add them to the appropriate province in positions.txt (the first value after x = and the second after y = )
The province titles are trickier, due to the
angle. I usually create a small rectangle and move it around the province map to see how it fits into the provinces. I rotate this rectangle separately for every province. Each time, I note the angle, which is given in degrees. The angles have to be converted to radians before they can be used in the engine. (Personally I hate radians, because you have to use so many decimals to get a 90 degree angle). This can be done in many ways, but I use the following formula:
radian = degree × 0.0174 (6,28/360)
It's very important that no objects are located in an area covered by PTI. If you put one there by mistake, the game will crash at
Initialising Maplogic. You can remove the latest entries and add them one by one to find the crash-causing entry. (The engine is capable of creating positions on its own if it doesn't find any entries in
positions.txt).
I recommend using MichaelM's Positions Editor for EU III.
TOPOLOGY
The height of the landscape is determined by the grey scale colour used in
topology.bmp. The lighter the shade, the higher the landscape. Coasts should have an RGB value somewhere around [ 7 7 7 ], and inland provinces higher. The sea level is at [ 5 5 5 ], which means that regions with lower values will be put under water. (This is quite useful when it comes to making inland lakes.) Finally, there is also a red colour [ 255 0 0 ], which has the same effect as [ 0 0 0 ].
Note that the topology file is
indexed, which means it only accepts certain colours. It's easier to work in a separate file, and copy the content to an existing topology file.
RIVERS
Rivers are added to the map via
rivers.bmp. Like
topology.bmp, this file is indexed, and it only recognizes six colours.
Code:
COLOUR R G B USE
White 255 255 255 Sea
Grey 187 187 187 Land
Green 0 255 0 Start of rivers
Cyan 0 250 255 Small rivers
Blue 0 0 150 Big rivers
Red 255 0 0 Junctions
Note that the white and grey colours are only used to make it easier to draw rivers, they have no effect on how the map shows up ingame. It's very important that the other four colours are used correctly, though.
The starting point of the river is given with
one pixel of green. If there's no green pixel, the river won't appear ingame. The path of the river is given as a line of cyan or blue, which has to be exactly one pixel wide
at all times. Otherwise, the game crashes at
Creating rivers (or just before). Finally, junctions (when one river flows into another) are given with
one pixel of red.
PROVINCE TEXTURES
The terrain map is dependent on a file called
colormap_hires.bmp (in
map/terrain) as well as the associated
colormap.txt and
colormap_time. In theory, changing the terrain map should also change province textures. The engine can't create province textures from a mod directory, however, which means you have to use the normal folders. This is how Modestus put it:
Step 1 Create your mod folder like in EU3 with your changed files then leave this alone for a while.
Step 2 Back to your vanilla folders and rename vanilla cache and colourmap_time so the game will create new ones.
Step 3 Create a new blank cache\ province_textures folders
Step 4 Replace the vanilla colour_hires.bmp and topology.bmp with your new files. (of course make backups first)
Step 5 Run game from default
The game should now create a new cache folder and colourmap_time
Step 6 Transfer this new cache and colourmap_ time to your mod folder but importantly also transfer an unchanged copy of your colourmap.txt file.
Step 7 Return everything to normal in your vanilla folders.
COMMON MISTAKES
- You use anti-aliasing with your marking tool when editing borders
- You position map objects in the PTI
Finally, you should read
Sakura's guide for more information. It's made for EU III, but the map files of that game work the same way as EUR.
