This thread is a terraining FAQ holding all questions that are often asked on this board and are easily answered. If you came to these boards to ask a question about terraining, odds are it's answered down here.
If you have any additional questions, feel free to pose them here so that I may add them to the list once answered.
Last but not least: if you came in here because you just 'want to terrain' but don't have an idea where to start, I recommend you start off checking out the Blizzard Tutorial to terraining - it's fairly informative and should get you on your way. Alternatively, try my own tutorial.
Index of questions:
General
How do I increase my map's size?
How does water work?
How do I add a sky (skybox) to my map?
How do I add fog to my map?
How do I create a black fog of war that does not show terrain until scouted?
How do I create 'space background' as seen in most maps located on space platforms?
Texture, Cliff and Pathing related
How do I allow cliff merging?
How do I add more textures to my tileset?
How do I copy and/or mirror terrain?
How does pathing work?
How do I alter textures directly on cliffs?
How do I fix the bug where my textures next to cliffs look completely messed up?
Doodad & Unit related
What are 'terrain objects' and how do they work?
How do I use campaign doodads/units?
How do I edit the properties of my doodads/How do I place doodads on inaccessible (low) ground?
How do I roll doodads along their pitch like in the Warcraft 3 editor?
How do I make doodads see-through when units move behind them/how does occlusion work?
Screenshot related
How do I make screenshots of my map?
How do I control the camera in the editor?
How do I apply camera effects like focus or blur?
Other/more specific
Wasn't there an official Blizzard Ice tileset?
How do I increase performance through terrain?
How do I edit my map's lighting?
How do I view actual weather effects in-editor instead of the simple "circle-with-cloud" markers?
My terrain heighting completely messes up whenever I place a building/Spells don't end up on the location of their spell markers but above or below it. What do I do?
How do I fix this bug where my minimap is completely black?
Go to Map > Map Bounds. The little arrows on the side will allow you to either increase your map, modify the camera bounds, or both at the same time, depending on which checkboxes you h ave marked.
How does water work? I've added it to my map but it doesn't seem to be showing?
Water, in Starcraft 2, works like a paint tool where you paint large squares with water. If your water isn't showing, be sure to select the water type you've used in the brush editor (the whole thing on the left side of your screen) and then click "Edit water". Here you can play with all sorts of options, though the most important one in your case might be the 'height' one. Play around with it and see if your water pops up - there's a good chance your water's height was set to be lower than the actual ground, making your water simply not show up in the editor or game. Additionally, viewing water can be toggled on or off by pressing 'W' - if you're sure your water should be showing and it isn't, you may have accidentally pushed this key. Pushing it again should solve your problem.
How do I add a skybox to my map?
Modules > Data. Set "Data Type:" to "Terrain Texture Sets". Click the terrain you're using in the list of terrains on the left. I.e. if you're making a map with the Bel'shir tileset, click the line that says "Bel'shir (Jungle) - Liberty.SC2Mod - Jungle. Activate table view if it isn't on yet (second button from the left in the row of buttons left of the search bar), find "Background Model (Fixed)" and double click the value behind it. Find a skybox you want to use, then press "OK". Note that maps that have a skybox will still need to use control+mouse wheel down to bring it into view. This option zooms the skybox in and out, and for some reason most skyboxes start off zoomed in to their maximum setting, meaning you will have to spend several seconds of scrolling to bring it into view in the editor.
How do I add fog to my map?
Let me reply to your question with a counterquestion - what kind of fog do you want? There are three kinds of fog. The first one is the general 'fog of war' that shrouds areas of the map not previously visited; see the next question for information on that.
The second one is doodad 'fog' objects. These have names like "Fog Blue" and "Fog Storm Deep" and can be found in the 'Environment' section of the doodad palette. Remember to press V to enter game view to actually see the fog in action instead of the placement helper.
The third and last type of fog is the fog that shows up in low ground areas. To activate this, go Modules > Data > Terrain Texture Sets > "The texture set you are using" > find the values with 'fog' in their name, there should be eight of them. All of these impact this fog in a different fashion, but to get you started: 'Fog Starting Height', 'Fog Enabled', 'Fog Color' and 'Fog Density' are the four most important options to make your fog visible.
My fog of war is grey, so people can see terrain even without exploring it. How do I install a black fog of war that prevents players from seeing any part of the map without exploring it?
Map > Map Options. Set the "Grey Mask" value behind "Unexplored Areas" to "Black Mask".
How do I create the space 'background' you see in some Blizzard maps?
This looks more complicated than it is - just use the lower cliff function. Spacy 'background' really is the equivalent of lower (unpathable) ground on other non-space tilesets.
How do I allow my cliffs to merge, so that manmade cliffs do not 'push away' natural cliffs and vice versa?
Tools > Brush > Allow Cliff Merging, or Shift+I. Note that merging manmade and natural cliffs will create ugly black voids where the two types meet; to hide these gaps, use doodads of the type "Cliff gap filler" listed under "Cliff and ramp". For a small tutorial on the matter, look here.
How do I add new tiles to my tileset so that I can use, say, Char tiles on my Bel'shir map?
Short answer: you can't. Long answer: you can't 'add' tiles, there is an internal limit of 8 per tileset. You can however 'swap tiles', allowing you to use, for example, 4 Bel'shir tiles, 2 Char tiles and 2 Korhal tiles. To do this, go Map > Map Textures > Modify > Activate "Show Table View" if it isn't on yet (second button from the left in the row of buttons left of the search bar) > find Textures - Blend > Double click the value behind it.
How do I copy terrain? Can I mirror my terrain to make it more symmetrical?
Like units and doodads, you can simply right-click drag a box over a piece of terrain and then press control+C to copy it, using control+V to paste it. You cannot copy terrain and doodads at the same time however. To mirror or turn copied terrain, copy a part of it, press control+V to get the placement marker, then open up the "edit" menu in the editor's taskbar - use the "Flip" and "Rotate" options to mirror copied terrain before putting it down.
How does pathing work?
Pathing is an integral part of terraining. The pathing tool works basically just the same as the texture painting tools - everything you paint red is inaccessible to units, everything you paint green is accessible. "No Building" pathing is the yellow kind of pathing you see around minerals and vespene geysers, preventing players from constructing Command Centres, Hatcheries or Nexi close to them. Note that custom pathing will overwrite the natural pathing cliffs have - if you paint a cliff green, units will be able to walk up and down the painted area like a ramp, even if it looks very weird.
I've got this weird problem where I can't alter textures in specific places where I've placed cliffs. How do I fix this?
The problem is one I can't explain, but I can tell you how to solve it: use the "Replace Texture" function instead of the "Add Texture" function, and you will be able to paint the otherwise unpaintable pieces of texture.
My cliffs are all messed up and the ground textures are somehow connecting to them like this! How do I fix this?
You've accidentally enabled the 'view hidden terrain cells' option. Press control+T to disable it. Alternatively, go View > Show Terrain > Show Hidden Terrain Cells and make sure it's not marked.
Terrain objects are doodads that instead of just 'standing on the landscape', in some way 'interact' with it. This means stuff like subway entrances, glass floors with rooms underneath them and trenches. Most terrain objects work in a fairly straightforward way. First, be sure that your map uses campaign dependencies (see next question). Second, put down the terrain object and third, go do the doodad palette (press D) and put it to "Terrain Object Doodads" - place the corresponding terrain object doodad right on top of your terrain object and turn it as needed.
NOTE: There is currently a bug with the 'trench' terrain object that causes the object to multiply itself whenever the map is loaded. After 3-4 loads you will be stuck with easily hundred thousand trenches and the map will have unplayable lag. This bug is pretty much unfixable for as far as we know. The trench object sometimes works normally, but use it at your own risk!
How do I place campaign units/doodads on my map? I can't find them anywhere!
How do I turn doodads? How do I make them larger or smaller? How do I place doodads on low (inaccessible) ground? How do I make it so that units can walk through my doodad? How do I give my doodad a custom colour?
Select the doodad by clicking it once, then press enter, or simply double-click it. Altering the rotation allows you to change the direction it faces, altering the scale allows you to make it larger/smaller (or wider/thinner if you uncheck "Uniform Y/Z"), checking "Custom Color" allows you to give it a custom color, checking Ignore Placement Requirements allows you to place the doodad wherever you want (including spots that shouldn't be accessible through normal means) and checking "Don't Use Doodad Footprint" allows your units to walk through the doodad as if it did not exist. Hotkeys for these functions exist as well. Holding shift while placing a doodad automatically checks off "Ignore Placement Requirement", holding control and clicking somewhere on the map while having the doodad selected will make the doodad face that direction, the < and > (or , and .) keys allow you to cycle through variations of the doodad (once placed down) and the plus and minus (+ and -) keys near your numpad allow you to make it smaller or larger (also once placed down).
How do I angle doodads or roll them along their pitch so that I can make, for example, walls out of pitched tables?
Short answer: as fas as is currently known, this isn't possible in the way it was in the Warcraft 3 world editor.
Long answer: changing the pitch of a doodad is alledgedly possible by editing the "Hosting - Host Site Operations" value of its actor in the data editor, but this would most likely mean that the doodad can bank over like flying units taking a curve rather than you being able to roll it along its pitch, Warcraft 3 style. It would most likely also only work in-game.
Some doodads, like large rocks, become see-through when units are walking behind them so they don't obscure vision. How can I apply this effect on other doodads?
This effect is known as 'occlusion', and it can be turned on or off for every doodad in the game in the data editor. Go Modules > Data > Models > "Your Model" (for example "Bel Shir Tree") > Find the table that says 'occlusion' and put it to 'none' for no occlusion or 'hide' for full occlusion.
For those looking for a way to determine the power of the occlusion (how well a doodad remains visible; is it completely transparant or is it still completely visible?): this cannot be done with the data editor, and to make certain doodads fade out more or less you will need to use triggering or model-editing (or model-swapping) solutions. You're going to have to look elsewhere for your answer.
You push the Print Screen button, which is located above the num pad on conventional keyboards. Screenshots are by default saved to the "C:\Users\Username\Documents\StarCraft II\Screenshots" folder.
How do I control the camera in the editor?
Scrolling the mouse wheel makes you zoom in or out in steps. Holding shift and dragging with the right mouse button makes you zoom in or out fluently. Holding alt and dragging with the right mouse button lowers or highers your camera. Holding control and dragging with your right mouse button changes the direction and pitch of the camera. If you want the same controls in-game to take screenshots in there, use the Free Camera Mode asset.
I saw someone do a cool focus effect on one of his screenshots where the camera focuses on the fore/background while blurring out the rest. How do I do this?
Note that a lot of people do a bit of photoshopping on their terrain screenshots before uploading them - not everything you see is possible in the editor. In case of Depth of Field though, it is. You will need to create a camera (move to the position and view you want in the editor, press C, click "Create Camera"), then press enter to edit it and then play with the various Depth of Field options to set them to your liking. Note that you'll need to use the "View Selected Camera" button again after every edit you make.
Window > Lighting. If it's not already opened, find the lighting that fits with your map and click on it. While a proper lighting tutorial explaining the functions of all options doesn't exist, try this tutorial for more information on how it works. To actually change your lighting permanently, follow the steps listed under "How do I add a skybox to my map?", but instead alter the "Lighting" field rather than the "Background Model (Fixed)" field.
I keep trying to place certain weather effects in my map (rain, fog, tumbleweeds), but they keep showing up as little icons with clouds in them, even though I've seen them work normally on screenshots. Why is this?
Effects like rain would be hard to select and thus edit in the editor, hence why there is a specific 'marker model' to make this easier. To be able to view the actual effects themselves in the editor, press 'V' to lock your camera in 'game view mode'. Press 'V' again to exit this mode when done.
I've got this weird bug where terrain gets needlessly raised under every building I place/heighting sometimes looks really weird/there is a difference between the markers of specific spells (say, Sentry Force Field) and the position it is actually appearing once cast. What do I do?
This is a known bug that generally occurs when playing with the 'change height field' option - notably when the height field is set to a number below 0 to automatically create fog on low ground areas. Bronxsy has a solution for the 'terrain raising under buildings' problem that involves editing some values in the data editor. The only way to fully fix the problem however, seems to be to backtrack the height edits you made in the 'change height field' option until the problem is fully fixed. The easiest way to do this is to place down a pylon and to enable the 'show power' option under 'View>Show Terrain', and then fiddling with the height until the middle of the power field is back below the pylon again. This thread has some more information and screenshots to describe the problem in greater detail.
My minimap is bugged and the terrain on it is completely black both in-game and in-editor, save for doodads and water. How do I fix this?
First off, be sure you have the latest version of Starcraft. This bug is often caused by loading up a map made made in version X of the editor with an older-than-X version of the editor. If this doesn't solve your problem, look here.
Hey, Mozared, could you please explain how to add the lighting to the map? Or, it's just that I need to always have Lightning tab open? I fear, that when I'll publish it, there will be no lightning settings that I've done.
Aw, silly me - I searched for LightNing, not for Lighting. Thakns :D
And still, that hasn't helped me. How can I be sure that the lighting that I created will be in game? (when I choose Show Lighting - Game, it resets to the default one.) :S
Hey, Mozared, could you please explain how to add the lighting to the map? Or, it's just that I need to always have Lightning tab open? I fear, that when I'll publish it, there will be no lightning settings that I've done.
One option is to right click any set of lighting and click "Add Default Map Light"; then edit that, and it should automatically sort itself out. The other option would be to simply edit the lightning set of the actual tileset you've picked - if you've picked Aiur, you should be able to simply edit the Aiur lighting set and have it work normally. What you probably want though, it this; Modules > Data > Terrain Texture Sets > Click on "Show Advanced Fields" if it isn't on yet > Select your terrain texture set name in the leftmost field > Scroll down and find "Lighting", set it to whatever lighting you want.
Thanks for the help Bronxsy - I intend to write all ways to improve performance terrain-wise down at some point. I'm thinking about whether I should put these things in here, or make a tutorial and maybe link to it. Until I figure out where to go, your post will suffice :)
I wrote up a tutorial regarding performance in maps in the terrain section and linked to it under the 'other' questions. Thanks for your assistance on the matter of water again, Bronx.
Just posting this as a note that I've updated it. As of 18-04-2011, the FAQ answers pretty much all questions one could have that relate to terrain. It also adresses numerous bugs or silly problems people run into.
Just curious as to which way is better for creating a city terrain. Using cliffs and putting doodads on them or setting up doodads? How much detail is needed for the cliffs if I go that way?
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Terraining FAQ
This thread is a terraining FAQ holding all questions that are often asked on this board and are easily answered. If you came to these boards to ask a question about terraining, odds are it's answered down here.
If you have any additional questions, feel free to pose them here so that I may add them to the list once answered.
Last but not least: if you came in here because you just 'want to terrain' but don't have an idea where to start, I recommend you start off checking out the Blizzard Tutorial to terraining - it's fairly informative and should get you on your way. Alternatively, try my own tutorial.
Index of questions:
General
Go to Map > Map Bounds. The little arrows on the side will allow you to either increase your map, modify the camera bounds, or both at the same time, depending on which checkboxes you h ave marked.
Water, in Starcraft 2, works like a paint tool where you paint large squares with water. If your water isn't showing, be sure to select the water type you've used in the brush editor (the whole thing on the left side of your screen) and then click "Edit water". Here you can play with all sorts of options, though the most important one in your case might be the 'height' one. Play around with it and see if your water pops up - there's a good chance your water's height was set to be lower than the actual ground, making your water simply not show up in the editor or game. Additionally, viewing water can be toggled on or off by pressing 'W' - if you're sure your water should be showing and it isn't, you may have accidentally pushed this key. Pushing it again should solve your problem.
Modules > Data. Set "Data Type:" to "Terrain Texture Sets". Click the terrain you're using in the list of terrains on the left. I.e. if you're making a map with the Bel'shir tileset, click the line that says "Bel'shir (Jungle) - Liberty.SC2Mod - Jungle. Activate table view if it isn't on yet (second button from the left in the row of buttons left of the search bar), find "Background Model (Fixed)" and double click the value behind it. Find a skybox you want to use, then press "OK". Note that maps that have a skybox will still need to use control+mouse wheel down to bring it into view. This option zooms the skybox in and out, and for some reason most skyboxes start off zoomed in to their maximum setting, meaning you will have to spend several seconds of scrolling to bring it into view in the editor.
Let me reply to your question with a counterquestion - what kind of fog do you want? There are three kinds of fog. The first one is the general 'fog of war' that shrouds areas of the map not previously visited; see the next question for information on that.
The second one is doodad 'fog' objects. These have names like "Fog Blue" and "Fog Storm Deep" and can be found in the 'Environment' section of the doodad palette. Remember to press V to enter game view to actually see the fog in action instead of the placement helper.
The third and last type of fog is the fog that shows up in low ground areas. To activate this, go Modules > Data > Terrain Texture Sets > "The texture set you are using" > find the values with 'fog' in their name, there should be eight of them. All of these impact this fog in a different fashion, but to get you started: 'Fog Starting Height', 'Fog Enabled', 'Fog Color' and 'Fog Density' are the four most important options to make your fog visible.
Map > Map Options. Set the "Grey Mask" value behind "Unexplored Areas" to "Black Mask".
This looks more complicated than it is - just use the lower cliff function. Spacy 'background' really is the equivalent of lower (unpathable) ground on other non-space tilesets.
Texture, Cliff and Pathing related
Tools > Brush > Allow Cliff Merging, or Shift+I. Note that merging manmade and natural cliffs will create ugly black voids where the two types meet; to hide these gaps, use doodads of the type "Cliff gap filler" listed under "Cliff and ramp". For a small tutorial on the matter, look here.
Short answer: you can't. Long answer: you can't 'add' tiles, there is an internal limit of 8 per tileset. You can however 'swap tiles', allowing you to use, for example, 4 Bel'shir tiles, 2 Char tiles and 2 Korhal tiles. To do this, go Map > Map Textures > Modify > Activate "Show Table View" if it isn't on yet (second button from the left in the row of buttons left of the search bar) > find Textures - Blend > Double click the value behind it.
Like units and doodads, you can simply right-click drag a box over a piece of terrain and then press control+C to copy it, using control+V to paste it. You cannot copy terrain and doodads at the same time however. To mirror or turn copied terrain, copy a part of it, press control+V to get the placement marker, then open up the "edit" menu in the editor's taskbar - use the "Flip" and "Rotate" options to mirror copied terrain before putting it down.
Pathing is an integral part of terraining. The pathing tool works basically just the same as the texture painting tools - everything you paint red is inaccessible to units, everything you paint green is accessible. "No Building" pathing is the yellow kind of pathing you see around minerals and vespene geysers, preventing players from constructing Command Centres, Hatcheries or Nexi close to them. Note that custom pathing will overwrite the natural pathing cliffs have - if you paint a cliff green, units will be able to walk up and down the painted area like a ramp, even if it looks very weird.
The problem is one I can't explain, but I can tell you how to solve it: use the "Replace Texture" function instead of the "Add Texture" function, and you will be able to paint the otherwise unpaintable pieces of texture.
You've accidentally enabled the 'view hidden terrain cells' option. Press control+T to disable it. Alternatively, go View > Show Terrain > Show Hidden Terrain Cells and make sure it's not marked.
Doodad & Unit related
Terrain objects are doodads that instead of just 'standing on the landscape', in some way 'interact' with it. This means stuff like subway entrances, glass floors with rooms underneath them and trenches. Most terrain objects work in a fairly straightforward way. First, be sure that your map uses campaign dependencies (see next question). Second, put down the terrain object and third, go do the doodad palette (press D) and put it to "Terrain Object Doodads" - place the corresponding terrain object doodad right on top of your terrain object and turn it as needed.
NOTE: There is currently a bug with the 'trench' terrain object that causes the object to multiply itself whenever the map is loaded. After 3-4 loads you will be stuck with easily hundred thousand trenches and the map will have unplayable lag. This bug is pretty much unfixable for as far as we know. The trench object sometimes works normally, but use it at your own risk!
Look here.
Select the doodad by clicking it once, then press enter, or simply double-click it. Altering the rotation allows you to change the direction it faces, altering the scale allows you to make it larger/smaller (or wider/thinner if you uncheck "Uniform Y/Z"), checking "Custom Color" allows you to give it a custom color, checking Ignore Placement Requirements allows you to place the doodad wherever you want (including spots that shouldn't be accessible through normal means) and checking "Don't Use Doodad Footprint" allows your units to walk through the doodad as if it did not exist. Hotkeys for these functions exist as well. Holding shift while placing a doodad automatically checks off "Ignore Placement Requirement", holding control and clicking somewhere on the map while having the doodad selected will make the doodad face that direction, the < and > (or , and .) keys allow you to cycle through variations of the doodad (once placed down) and the plus and minus (+ and -) keys near your numpad allow you to make it smaller or larger (also once placed down).
Short answer: as fas as is currently known, this isn't possible in the way it was in the Warcraft 3 world editor.
Long answer: changing the pitch of a doodad is alledgedly possible by editing the "Hosting - Host Site Operations" value of its actor in the data editor, but this would most likely mean that the doodad can bank over like flying units taking a curve rather than you being able to roll it along its pitch, Warcraft 3 style. It would most likely also only work in-game.
This effect is known as 'occlusion', and it can be turned on or off for every doodad in the game in the data editor. Go Modules > Data > Models > "Your Model" (for example "Bel Shir Tree") > Find the table that says 'occlusion' and put it to 'none' for no occlusion or 'hide' for full occlusion.
For those looking for a way to determine the power of the occlusion (how well a doodad remains visible; is it completely transparant or is it still completely visible?): this cannot be done with the data editor, and to make certain doodads fade out more or less you will need to use triggering or model-editing (or model-swapping) solutions. You're going to have to look elsewhere for your answer.
Screenshot related
You push the Print Screen button, which is located above the num pad on conventional keyboards. Screenshots are by default saved to the "C:\Users\Username\Documents\StarCraft II\Screenshots" folder.
Scrolling the mouse wheel makes you zoom in or out in steps. Holding shift and dragging with the right mouse button makes you zoom in or out fluently. Holding alt and dragging with the right mouse button lowers or highers your camera. Holding control and dragging with your right mouse button changes the direction and pitch of the camera. If you want the same controls in-game to take screenshots in there, use the Free Camera Mode asset.
Note that a lot of people do a bit of photoshopping on their terrain screenshots before uploading them - not everything you see is possible in the editor. In case of Depth of Field though, it is. You will need to create a camera (move to the position and view you want in the editor, press C, click "Create Camera"), then press enter to edit it and then play with the various Depth of Field options to set them to your liking. Note that you'll need to use the "View Selected Camera" button again after every edit you make.
Other/more specific
The ice tileset is called "Niflheim" and was deleted from the beta. It has been salvaged however, and can be found here.
Look here.
Window > Lighting. If it's not already opened, find the lighting that fits with your map and click on it. While a proper lighting tutorial explaining the functions of all options doesn't exist, try this tutorial for more information on how it works. To actually change your lighting permanently, follow the steps listed under "How do I add a skybox to my map?", but instead alter the "Lighting" field rather than the "Background Model (Fixed)" field.
Effects like rain would be hard to select and thus edit in the editor, hence why there is a specific 'marker model' to make this easier. To be able to view the actual effects themselves in the editor, press 'V' to lock your camera in 'game view mode'. Press 'V' again to exit this mode when done.
This is a known bug that generally occurs when playing with the 'change height field' option - notably when the height field is set to a number below 0 to automatically create fog on low ground areas. Bronxsy has a solution for the 'terrain raising under buildings' problem that involves editing some values in the data editor. The only way to fully fix the problem however, seems to be to backtrack the height edits you made in the 'change height field' option until the problem is fully fixed. The easiest way to do this is to place down a pylon and to enable the 'show power' option under 'View>Show Terrain', and then fiddling with the height until the middle of the power field is back below the pylon again. This thread has some more information and screenshots to describe the problem in greater detail.
First off, be sure you have the latest version of Starcraft. This bug is often caused by loading up a map made made in version X of the editor with an older-than-X version of the editor. If this doesn't solve your problem, look here.
Hey Mozared and thanks for linking my tutorial about dependencies :)
Hey, Mozared, could you please explain how to add the lighting to the map? Or, it's just that I need to always have Lightning tab open? I fear, that when I'll publish it, there will be no lightning settings that I've done.
@o3210: Go
did you try searching?
http://forums.sc2mapster.com/resources/tutorials/12834-terrain-trix-3-lighting-guide/
Aw, silly me - I searched for LightNing, not for Lighting. Thakns :D
And still, that hasn't helped me. How can I be sure that the lighting that I created will be in game? (when I choose Show Lighting - Game, it resets to the default one.) :S
One option is to right click any set of lighting and click "Add Default Map Light"; then edit that, and it should automatically sort itself out. The other option would be to simply edit the lightning set of the actual tileset you've picked - if you've picked Aiur, you should be able to simply edit the Aiur lighting set and have it work normally. What you probably want though, it this; Modules > Data > Terrain Texture Sets > Click on "Show Advanced Fields" if it isn't on yet > Select your terrain texture set name in the leftmost field > Scroll down and find "Lighting", set it to whatever lighting you want.
I've changed the lighting that was being used. And it worked. Thanks, I really appreciate it! :D
Faq is awesome... thank you... it's nice to see what's underneath that hulk thumb that is Mozared
is your avatar a reverse smiley? :)
Water waves from Terrain Heighting (Beach Shorelines) can cause severe performance drops. Disabling them can increase performance greatly.
To disable them go into Data Editor - > Water - > Select Water and set Beach Shorelines to None.
Thanks for the help Bronxsy - I intend to write all ways to improve performance terrain-wise down at some point. I'm thinking about whether I should put these things in here, or make a tutorial and maybe link to it. Until I figure out where to go, your post will suffice :)
I wrote up a tutorial regarding performance in maps in the terrain section and linked to it under the 'other' questions. Thanks for your assistance on the matter of water again, Bronx.
@Mozared: Go
Very nice & np.
Just posting this as a note that I've updated it. As of 18-04-2011, the FAQ answers pretty much all questions one could have that relate to terrain. It also adresses numerous bugs or silly problems people run into.
thankyou for helping me with the problem i had a while ago: the soloution is to use the view as game mode/ V
so if anyone elses map editor ( i think it might be only EU) dosnt display a space/background or has odd looking cliffs press V!
Just curious as to which way is better for creating a city terrain. Using cliffs and putting doodads on them or setting up doodads? How much detail is needed for the cliffs if I go that way?