47 replies to this topic

[Scryer]

Hey kids I'm back. And with the amount of free time I have (thank god my exams ended on the first day of exam week ), I have decided to take a shot at mapping again. Except this time I'm following matt's tutorial. Here is the link. And I got my inspiration from this picture I found on google. I like giving credit .

Anyways I've spent quite a bit of time on the Umbar re-make and I would like your guys' input on my progress. Suggestions and criticism are welcome!

First up is my Umbar Layout design. It has a legend in its description... This is generally the playability that I want my map to have minus the little yellow blob attached to the city....

Basically I want a Corsair city (which is something else I want to talk about later..) to be in a place in the map where the siegers are more likely to win a siege via naval units. And I am having Umbar connected to another island (via bridge) which will be dedicated to all naval unit production for the player in Umbar.

Here are the screenshots of what it looks like in the game. Screenshots of my work progress can be found throughout this thread.

Screenshot 1
Screenshot 2
Screenshot 3
Screenshot 4
Screenshot 5
Screenshot 6
Screenshot 7
Screenshot 8


Umbar 1.0 can be found below; it is my first completed version:

 Umbar_1.0.rar   328.22KB   56 downloads


For the land around Umbar, I am going for a very barren-Haradrim look. The northern piece of land is suppose to be "softer" while the southern piece of land is suppose to be "rougher".. The way that I envisioned the map is that the southern piece of land is a part of the edges of Far Harad.

The city of Umbar... I have no idea where to start for that part . I know that I want it circular, attached to the island which it will use as its harbour, and I do want its walls to have attached trebuchets; beyond that I have no idea what I want to put into the city. Or even its textures to be honest... So suggestions for this aspect are more than welcome!

Edited by Scryer, 06 January 2010 - 01:02 AM.

[_Haldir_]

Looking pretty good dude , though i have a few suggestions.
I'd probably try and increase the land area on your map, maybe something towards this sorta thing:


That way your bfme2 players will have enough room for resource buildings, and space to move units. If you can make more of the space on the map, you won't have massive areas of water that aren't going to be used by players (because players aren't really going to use all that water, probably just routes to and from other players )

Also, a bit more terrain might give attacking players a better chance against the Umbar player (who really only has two areas to have to defend). Balance wise, it gives attacking players more of a chance, and lets them use a mixture of naval and ground units. You can have a naval based map, but eventually you'll need an area to drop your units off transports, and storm the city

The texturing's looking real nice though I'd perhaps swap that dry cracked texture with one a bit more sandy and less obvious, but it's not a major issue. It's funny cause i'm currently making an Umbar map myself, though for bfme1. There's some good potential loading pics if you google a place called "Dubrovnik".

With the city itself, start with the walls and work inwards. There's gotta be enough room for the player to build stuff though, so you don't need heaps of buildings. For your textures, i'd suggest using similar dirt/sand textures as you've been using, but add in occasional ruined cobblestone type textures. I doubt corsairs would keep the city too clean, so i wouldn't texture the city as if it's brand new

Hoped that was useful man

[Scryer]

I'll be updating any screenshots on my first post. I've got two new screenshots up now!

Thanks for the advice and feedback Haldir! I'll be replying now .

I'd probably try and increase the land area on your map, maybe something towards this sorta thing

At first I disagreed and then I compared a fortress + buildings on the map itself and quickly changed my mind . I have increased the land mass. I even had to re-scale my map which created an "equator" in my textures .... I fixed that though. Anyways I have increased the land mass and to give you guys a better idea of how much of an increase that I gave it, here's another screenshot. It's hard to see but I definitely gave the southern land mass another "jut" into the water.. I textured the hill by that "jut" to try and show you guys that I plan on texturing the land there. And it's also difficult to pin-point the island-by-the-city, that I showed you guys in my outline...

I'd perhaps swap that dry cracked texture with one a bit more sandy and less obvious, but it's not a major issue.

I'm actually using sandier textures as the main texture that fills in that beautful gray area (I've come to like it now ). I am sticking with my dry-cracked textures though because they did turn out really nice; and one of the effects that I am looking to achieve in the southern piece of land is that it is a very harsh, untamed territory when it's not near the water. I'm also looking to do sandy beaches and a sandy ocean floor on both pieces of land so you'll get your share of sand .

The northern piece of land, will be a lot less harsh than the southern piece of land; it will be quieter, calmer, etc. For me, the southern-est parts of the land (in my map) is crossing into Far Harad. And I've always viewed Far Harad as a very hardcore desert. And then we have Umbar, which I am hoping will turn out to look like the "jewel" (for lack of a better word) of the desert.

With the city itself, start with the walls and work inwards. There's gotta be enough room for the player to build stuff though, so you don't need heaps of buildings. For your textures, i'd suggest using similar dirt/sand textures as you've been using, but add in occasional ruined cobblestone type textures.

Thanks, I will definitely do that! I'm going to be placing a fair amount of outposts within the city... I know that, for sure. Right now I am texturing over the city before I make any decisions on its shape, size, and its textures. With Umbar, I am going for a "Jerusalem" look from Assassin's Creed (shut-up people, the game has sick environments!) except more run-down. I might just get lazy enough and see if someone wants to partner up to do the city+its island for me lol .

[Devon]

In the third screenshot in your first post the change from the cracked texture to the grassy one seems a little too close together, but otherwise it's looking very pretty

[Puzzler33]

In the third screenshot in your first post the change from the cracked texture to the grassy one seems a little too close together, but otherwise it's looking very pretty

I agree with that...

What I don't understand is whether this is 2v1 (like Rivendell) or 1v1v1 (somewhat like Grey Havens if I am thinking of the right map). You should also think about whether people would shy away from the defensive role (as in Dol Guldor and usually Minas Tirith and Helm's Deep) or whether they would prefer not to attack (perhaps Helm's Deep Morning Light or something like Amon Hen). Anyway my point is that when you have a defensive advantage it makes your map unbalanced so think carefully about (even if you counter it with inns, outposts, signal fires, neutral towers) how much of an advantage being in the city is. That was mostly based on the assumption that it would be 2v1 but I suppose it still applies if it's FFA. If it's a free-for-all then how will being in the city change things? In Grey Havens people generally don't want to defend the middle dock bit because even with the outposts and towers they are in the middle of the other two players so people usually play it 1v1 and don't go in the middle.

Anyway good luck with the map (not that you need luck when you're making a map).

[Scryer]

What I don't understand is whether this is 2v1 (like Rivendell) or 1v1v1 (somewhat like Grey Havens if I am thinking of the right map).

It is both a 2v1 and a free-for-all. In my opinion, it functions better as a free-for-all. Grey Havens and the BFME version of Umbar are basically the same map anyways . I honestly enjoyed the BFME Umbar map but what I found (which is what I'm trying to change) is that EA could've made it so that players would be forced to build some naval units. Plus I found that EA didn't do Umbar any visual justice considering where they were located.

In the third screenshot in your first post the change from the cracked texture to the grassy one seems a little too close together

I will fiddle around with that. And by fiddle around, I mean replace the grassy texture on the hills with my yellow-rock one and see if it makes a difference lol.

You should also think about whether people would shy away from the defensive role

That depends on the individual though... At best, if someone is bitching about defending against two other players, they can always choose to play another map . It is suppose to be played as a 2v1 or a free-for-all and players should know that when they are considering playing this map... Sorry I really don't have a solution for this other than the advantages and disadvantages of being in the city.

Anyway my point is that when you have a defensive advantage it makes your map unbalanced so think carefully about (even if you counter it with inns, outposts, signal fires, neutral towers) how much of an advantage being in the city is. That was mostly based on the assumption that it would be 2v1 but I suppose it still applies if it's FFA. If it's a free-for-all then how will being in the city change things?

I'm really glad you brought up this point so that I can just type down my ideas for myself. I'm just going to list the anticipated advantages and disadvantages of being in the city:

Advantages:

- You will get an Inn, at least 1 outpost (I'm pretty sure I'm only going to give the Umbar player 1 outpost..), and several harbourmasters (is that what the ship-constructing building is called?) in the early game. You get resources fast.

- Walkable walls and gates that can close. And if I can do it, wall-mounted pre-built trebuchets (maybe mounted ballistas if I am God).

- Only one person will be able to harrass you in the early game.

- One player will have to attack you from the sea. This is not much of an advantage but you can anticipate that attack and harrass them or build up a strong navy.

- I will be placing the gate to Umbar (the gate that faces the southern player) in the southeastern corner (circles don't have corners though ). This makes it so that the attacking player (who decided to attack the gate) has to walk really close to Umbar's walls before they reach the gate. This gives the umbar player to attack them from the walls while they do this.


Disadvantages:

- To attack the North player from the city, you have to navigate to the western part of that land where there is a beach; which allows you to land troops on. It's a little while away from your harbour island, so you can easily get attacked on the sea or the North player can anticipate your arrival and already have troops being sent to the beach.

- To attack the South player from the city, you have to send troops through a narrower piece of land which will bottleneck (I use this word loosely) your army to some extent. This is not much of a disadvantage though.

- The harbour-island is going to have tons of area to land on whereas the other pieces of land only have one landing beach. By the way, once you lose your harbour island, you lose the ability to produce ships; unless you've got another harbourmaster somewhere else or unless you counter-attack and take it over again.


I definitely see what you're saying about the Gray Havens map. I would have to look at that map again but iirc it did not have any walkable walls or gates. Which, in my opinion, is a huge advantage for the defending player. In the Gray Havens map, two players can attack one player on land. In my map, you can only attack Umbar in a land-siege once you have your units on the southern piece of land.

I've got new screen shots up in my first post!! I've finished texturing the southern piece of land minus the city and the portion that you guys all agreed looked funny . It also shows the textures that I plan on using for the beaches and some vegetation. No rocks have been added yet..

Edited by Scryer, 18 December 2009 - 01:58 AM.

[Crusard]

Good planning usually leads to great maps

For the citiscape, buildings are always a cool thing to have and there's plenty of them in BFME2's object list. Try making blocks in a radial way [like several "rings" of buildings with the fortress in the center (a cool central square)]. Leave plenty of room in the center to build any production buildings that may be needed.

A long time ago I had made a sea battle map with a custom ini that has many new types of ships with custom abilities (corsair raiders, corsair mine layers, elven harrassers, etc). But I never posted the final version of the map because it's playability wasn't good enough
If you like, I could send you the map for you to check out the ships, might add a little extra to your map

[Scryer]

Okay, I have been doing props. Here's a screenie of that, and here's another screenshot of the grassy patches y'all complained about . I also attempted a bridge in that picture as well. In regards to the props, I have only done the props from one view for now. I want your feedback on it incase there are too many trees or something.

By the way, I'm not going to update you guys daily; just when I want feedback. I'm a very insecure mapper at the moment .

For the citiscape, buildings are always a cool thing to have and there's plenty of them in BFME2's object list. Try making blocks in a radial way [like several "rings" of buildings with the fortress in the center (a cool central square)]. Leave plenty of room in the center to build any production buildings that may be needed.

Now that this is at the back of my mind.. Thank you.

A long time ago I had made a sea battle map with a custom ini that has many new types of ships with custom abilities...

That sounds great and all but I am a NOOB mapper!! This is my third map (the other two maps, literally went to hell) and I am strictly following m@tt's tutorial . If you want to still send it over to me, go ahead; but I can't gurantee that I'll be able to use your stuff if I have to install it further than a regular map download. If it's just a regular winzip extraction, then I should be okay to use it with a set of installation instructions (like where to extract it to). And if I do use anything (which it sounds like I will), I'll definitely be giving you credit if I ever get this thing up for download.

Edited by Scryer, 18 December 2009 - 05:07 AM.

[Puzzler33]

Just as a thought I think that if I were to play this map I would want to be the one with no land connection to anyone else because you would just need to make and garrison some towers and send out raiding parties.

I gather that this is BfME II and I am speaking with experience from the RotWK expansion so this unit may not exist, but assuming they do, will you be disabling the building of those harpoon ships (I'm talking about the ship which isn't a: transport, battleship or 'fire'/storm ship). I think in any case a map with ships is best when there are only transports and battle ships.

[Masterbadeend]

That sounds great and all but I am a NOOB mapper!! This is my third map (the other two maps, literally went to hell) and I am strictly following m@tt's tutorial .

That was exactly my route. My first map was finished, but there wasn't any balance in it, and my second map was only a little bit better. My third map was good enough to be played online .

[Crusard]

That sounds great and all but I am a NOOB mapper!! This is my third map (the other two maps, literally went to hell) and I am strictly following m@tt's tutorial .

That was exactly my route. My first map was finished, but there wasn't any balance in it, and my second map was only a little bit better. My third map was good enough to be played online .

And that's usually the best way to improve your mapping. Always going a step further than your last map
Though some of us (well, just myself) have been working and reworking on their first map for over a year

[Scryer]

will you be disabling the building of those harpoon ships

I think in any case a map with ships is best when there are only transports and battle ships.

Interesting suggestion... To be honest, I'm leaning towards a "no" on this one. My reason being that Umbar would be more successfully sieged from naval units. With Umbar I am having mounted trebuchets on the walls (hopefully); quite a few of them will be aimed towards the ocean. I do realize that ships will be moving around more but for some of the mounted trebuchets that I am planning, you would only be able to destroy them if you had a fell-beast ringwraith/eagle or a siege weapon within the city. Not only that but the Umbar player can also create movable siege-weapons as well.

I know that the siege-ships are rediculously OP with their range.. If this map didn't have the city of Umbar, I would have definitely considered disabling the siege-ships since there would be almost no use for them.

Though some of us (well, just myself) have been working and reworking on their first map for over a year..

I have a feeling that that might be the case with me on this map .

In all seriousness though, I would like to get some feedback on my choice of props, vegetation, etc. I even uploaded some new pics of what I think is a finished portion of my map. You can find those screenshots on my first post. And by the way, thanks a lot for the feedback so far. It is really helpful .

Edited by Scryer, 18 December 2009 - 08:06 PM.

[Crusard]

Could you upload true resolution screenshots? That way we can look into texture and props detail better

[Scryer]

True resolution? Did I not emphasize that noob part enough ? I'll edit this out later to prevent my own embarassment but how do you turn on true resolution for screenshots?

I don't want to spam my thread with screenshot nonsense. I'm editing them now. Thanks for the help, Cru!

I've got the images edited since I have nothing else to do this week. You have to click on them in order to get a better view.

Edited by Scryer, 18 December 2009 - 09:55 PM.

[Crusard]

I mean your desktop looks like it's 1280x1024, but the uploaded screenshots seem to be resized to 800x600 and look very choppy.
You can use IrfanView to handle screenshots and then upload them to ImageShack.

[Scryer]

Hey guys,

I've got a new screenshot added to the first post, showing some ingame action this time. So far, it's eye-candy when you have your own units running around and everything . But that's a biased opinion.

I'm going to address an anticipated question here; I won't be sending this map for public upload testing until I have the bottom and top areas of land all textured/propped and water added in. This does not include the city though. From the looks of it, by the time I have all of the land textured and propped, it'll be time for school again (once again this isn't including the city being completed). So I figure that to put the ''edge'' off of releasing a completed version, that I release an incomplete (but playable) version of Umbar.

That news aside, I may have made a very horrifying noobish mistake that is hinted in the mini-map of the new screenshot I'm updating... Is there anyway to adjust the borders without re-sizing the map ? Right now the border is 30X10ft and it needs to be made a LOT smaller, so I was hoping that there might be a technique to adjust the borders without having to resize/retexture my map. I've learned from this mistake though and I am now enabling borders to be seen Any help here would be greatly appreciated!

[Puzzler33]

Bearing in mind that you can't move the bottom left corner of the border, without resizing the map you can only push the top right corner of the border to the edge and move everything inside accordingly. Sometimes resizing the map works quite well, you just need to terrain copy and paste, select everything and move it all to the new position and individually drag any water. The principle is that the bottom left corner is fixed but you can resize using different anchors in the map... anyway the point is that once you've made this mistake you can fix it even if it doesn't mean a particularly instant fix, and bear in mind that it sometimes messes up the minimap image when loading (it should be fine in-game though).

To edit a border click the icon that looks like

BOR
DER

and drag the top right-hand corner of the map.
This will not work if you only have 'View border' ticked.

[Masterbadeend]

Or simply resize the map.

[mike_]

Very good work, Scryer

[Scryer]

Okay, so I resized the map and dealt with the textures . Got another noob question :

I've been playing the map to see if everything is going down okay... For the most part it is except for the creeps and capturable buildings.
For the creeps I assign them to PlyrCreeps= "PlryCreeps" under the build list window. And for the capturable buildings (like signal fires, shipwrights, etc) I assign them to (neutral player, cannot be edited) under the build list window. I've visited a couple of walkthroughs for Worldbuilder and they say that I can edit an object's team through the Object Properties window using the Select and Move mouse; the problem is that when I have the Select and Move mouse selected, I can't select objects like the Warg Lairs or Shipwrights.... Yet I can select trees and shrubs . I have ShowObject Icons on as well.... Is there anyway to solve this problem?

When I go to play the map, the capturable buildings, their flags, and creep lairs don't show up at all in my game. And I do have those objects listed as being built.

By the way, I do not have any of those black-blob objects anywhere in my map so I'm thinking that this is probably the problem.

And thanks mike, Masterbadeend, and Puzzler for your advice/feedback!

Edited by Scryer, 21 December 2009 - 01:17 AM.