Mapping Guidelines

From Savage 2 Strategy Wiki

1 Basic Guidelines
2 Mapping Checklist
3 Examples
- 3.1 Mountain Texturing Example 01
- 3.2 Mountain Texturing Example 02

Basic Guidelines

Page is getting fleshed out.

- Merc

Mapping Checklist

The following will need to be decided upon and put into place for a map to be considered complete.

This checklist is not yet complete. It's going to be huge

Initial Considerations
- A Savage 2 map with a size of 8 and scale of 64 can take an extraordinary amount of time to complete. A good map can easily take as much as 40 hours or more to complete and will progress through several iterations before the map is completed.
  - It's almost certain that a map will take many more times to complete than the original estimate, especially for beginner mappers.
  - Most mappers will scrap at least a few early maps before refining their technique and coming up with a practical map. Even experienced mappers will discard maps from time to time.
  - Once a map is visually acceptable and suitable for gameplay, a large amount of polishing and testing will be required.
  - Many, many maps are released before they are fully complete. For beginner mappers (generally, this includes almost all Savage 2 mappers at the moment), they should consider their completed maps to really be at about 33% completion. Usually balance considerations, map practicality, and aesthetics require a significant amount of extra work for the map to truly be considered complete.
Map Size
- It's important to make sure that your map is large enough to be comfortable for the intended play, but not too large to where players are excessively running around to reach objectives and games drawn on too long. Size 8 Scale 64 is preferred. The scale value should not be adjusted (always 64), as it will adversely affect how textures tile. Size 7 is the size of the duel arena. Size 8 is four times as large and is the size of deadlock, eden, desolation, and other medium-sized maps. Size 9 is four times as large as size 8 and is generally used for the largest maps (crossroads), or for when a mapper needs slightly more space than a size 8 map offers and doesn't mind having a large mountain border (hiddenvillage, hellpeak, losthills).
Map Layout
- Map layout is the single strongest determining factor for how a map plays out. Consider the following:
  - Choke points help to funnel players through positions, facilitate group combat, and provide points on the map where base defenses can be highly effective.
  - Height greatly affects players' ability to attack and defend. Players with a height advantage generally are in a far better position to attack enemies and defend positions. Combining a height advantage with a choke point can create areas that are extremely easy to defend and very difficult to assault.
  - High paths on the side of a main path provide a decision between freedom of movement/use of nearby terrain features and a higher vantage point to attack from. These areas can often be used to create ambushes or for placing less vulnerable gadgets and defensive structures.
  - Trenches provide paths that players can use to sneak across areas and stay out of sight, but provide the disadvantage of making players traveling through the trench more vulnerable to attack and giving them less movement options (trenches are usually a few constrained paths).
  - Certain areas will need to be open for the placement of objects such as base structures and garrisons/sublairs, as well as objects that are placed around the map such as walls, trees, rocks, and structure props (ruins structures, tents, huts), etc.
  - Paths should not be so long as to plague players with excessive traveling. Generally, maximum travel time from base to base on a map geared for about 22 players should be no longer than 2 minutes for a savage who walks exclusively (no sprinting, charging, dodging, or buffs), and preferably closer to 1.5 minutes.
    - Crossroads is an example of a map that is plagued by excessive travel times.
    - Hiddenvillage partially mitigates the travel time problem with a multitude of paths that lead from area to area, including the center of the map which can easily lead to any other point in the map.
Map Theatre
- The map texturing, prop choices, and environment (generally referred to as the map's theatre) will greatly factor into the appearance and gameplay of your map. It's important to create a theatre that promotes gameplay that is focused yet flexible, interesting to play in, and that provides fast gameplay. Multiple theatres can be used in the same map to provide a variety of interesting areas to play in. Some example theatres are:
  - Jungle
  - Forest
  - Village
  - Ruins/Temple
  - Castles/Fortifications
  - Desert
  - Snow
  - Wasteland
  - Temperate
Deforming
- Deforming a map to create both the basic shape of the map and to form smaller, more specific features, is one of the largest tasks in map development. It can often take hours upon hours to shape the map into its final form.
  - Certain areas will need be deformed to cater to objects on the terrain, and others need to be deformed according to the textures that you give them.
    - Walls props that are built onto mountains will need to have mountains that have a steep drop next to the wall. Examples of this can be found at the center of hiddenvillage.
    - Sand and snow tend to clump up near the sides of rocks and structures. Examples of this can be found in desolation and moonlight. They also tend to accumulate in concave areas.
    - Consider how water may flow through a map and carve rivers and mountains according to those paths.
  - Roads tend to sink into the terrain a bit due to constant erosion by travelers. Examples of this can be found in hiddenvillage and desolation.
  - Border mountains which define paths in a map need to be formed into believable mountain shapes. Generally these should look like stylized versions of individual mountains formed by natural events such as erosion, glacial activity, and volcanoes.
  - Border mountains must be steep enough to be believably impossible to cross. If it appears that the player can climb in an area, they should be permitted to do so (aka no blockers in the way) and it should be intended by the mapper.
Texturing
- Texturing a map is another of the larger tasks for mapping. Texturing gives the map's hills, mountains, roads, and other forms a convincing and aesthetically pleasing appearance. Proper texturing helps to bring life to a map, and should work hand in hand with your deforming.
  1. Texture
    - The primary tool for texturing applies textures to surfaces, and defines most of their appearance. Textures are applied on two layers. Layer 1 is the primary layer and used for covering large swaths of terrain. Layer 2 is the secondary layer and is used for adding detail and creating seamless transitions between two different layer 1 textures.
    - It's important to have patches of layer 2 texture over large areas of layer 1 texture to break up tiling and create a more pleasing appearance (aka less plain).
    - Layer 2 is great for things like roads, concave areas in mountains that would be filled with sand, snow, or debris, and bunches of leaves under trees.
  2. Alpha
    - The alpha tool is great for adding precise shapes to terrain features.
    - The edges of roads can be roughed up a bit with the alpha tool.
    - Grassy/Mossy patches amongst more barren textures can be highlighted with varied edges.
    - Snow on mountains and on the sides of roads look much better and less like white smudges with more defined edges.
    - Transitions between two high contrast textures can look more appropriate with alpha work to make the edges look convincing.
  3. Color
    - The color tool is great for adding emphasis to terrain features and to make entities feel stand out less.
    - Most color work is best done with a strength 4-6 brush, which allows the color work to be noticeable yet still relatively subtle.
    - The terrain under and around rocks and buildings generally looks best with a dark color - usually black or brown.
    - Terrain under trees should be darkened a bit.
    - Using a large brush to fill in terrain shadows (once the environment has been finalized, particularly the sun altitude and azimuth) can help soften terrain shadows. This should be done in a very subtle manner.
    - Texture tiling will be less noticeable and the terrain will look more interesting with patches of color in different areas.
      - Spots of dark oranges and reds can make grassy areas look more appealing. Sometimes green is preferably in more lush jungle areas.
      - Subtle black patches around more desolate terrain can help emphasize the battle-torn appearance.
      - Patches of brown coloring can help improve the appearance of desert maps.
      - Very subtle blue patches can liven up the appearance of snow maps.
    - Most of the color work that you do will be more noticeable to experienced mappers than to the average player, but most players will detect that the map has a certain "something" that the map wouldn't have without good color work.
Foliage
- Proper use of foliage can make areas of the map look much more lush and detailed, giving the appearance of grass, bramble, flowers, and other plants.
  - Grass should not impede player visibility.
    - Grass of heights larger than about 1/4 a builder's height should be avoided.
    - Chiprels can often be hard to see in grassy patches.
  - Grass that looks like a fresh-cut lawn can look boring and unnatural. The edges of grassy patches should fade out and grass height should vary noticeably within patches.
  - Green and temperate/grassy maps are not the only candidates for foliage.
    - Desert maps can benefit from bramble and the occasional desert flower.
    - Maps with yellow grassy fields (crossroads, for example) can benefit from patches of the yellow grass foliage texture.
    - Snow maps sometimes have grassy patches where the grass has poked out from the snow, and there are often patches on the map that are not covered by snow.
Environment
- The environment settings control how a map is lit. These changes can dramatically alter the appearance and mood of the map, and it's important to choose settings that highlight the map's theatre and landmarks.
  - The lighting on the map can affect the mood of the gameplay. Gloomy afternoon/early night lighting with lots of oranges and reds can make the map tiring to play on, as it can pass on the subliminal message that it's the end of the day/time to settle down.
  - Maps that are unnecessarily bright can give the effect of being blindingly bright and will be hard to look at for extended periods of time.
  - It's important to take care with darker lighting, especially for night maps. There are many players with monitors that aren't properly calibrated and for whom the map will look significantly darker on. A map that is dark but clear for you could be nearly pitch black for other players.
    - It's important to have a decent-quality and properly-calibrated monitor when mapping so that colors and lighting are appropriate. Your map should look clear and appropriate even when brighter, darker, or slightly off-color, as players' monitor and video card settings can vary widely.
    - You CANNOT expect players to properly calibrate their monitors and video card settings. Players may be unwilling to do so, unable to learn how to, or their monitor and video card's max brightness may still be too dark (older CRT monitors in particular).
    - For night maps, it may be better to have a bright map with close dark fog and dark sky coloring to simulate low visibility while still allowing players to clearly see the terrain and objects nearby.
  - Light objects should be placed to emphasize a source of light, such as a campfire or torch.
    - A small reddish-orange light above a scar can give the appearance of a hellish burning light emitting from the scar.
    - Light emitted from light objects won't appear if the players' graphics settings are turned down.
    - Light objects should not be used in place of proper environment lighting and should not be the sole method of making an area visible.
Sounds
- Sounds help to transition a map from being a simple arena for combat to being a living breathing environment. A map with a proper sound environment is much more convincing than one without sounds or without appropriate sounds.
  - Consider where insects and animals may reside - in bushes, trees, near or under rocks, etc.
  - Sounds emitted from water should be appropriate to the area and movement of the water. Rivers should sound as if they're flowing, and ponds might sound like occasional trickling and splashing of water.
  - Heavily forested areas may have lots of leaves rustling and animal sounds.
  - Trees blowing in the wind should rustle appropriately.
  - Wind can make a map sound open, barren, and desolate. Wind can also highlight spookier areas or areas that are paths through mountains.
  - Thunder sounds outside the navigable areas of a map can indicate incoming storms (particularly for maps that use the storm script for occasional thunderstorms).
  - Snow tends to absorb sound, and thus snow maps should be unusually quiet.
  - Night maps tend to be more quiet, and will have noticeable insect sounds like cricket chirping.
  - Sounds should be just loud and frequent enough to be noticeable, but should be something that players aren't forced to notice or pay attention to during combat
    - Generally, sounds placed around a map should be much lower in volume than combat sounds.
    - There shouldn't be an excessive amount of sound emitters to the point where the map seems to be cluttered with excessive noise.
Blockers
- It's important to define the impassible areas of your map with blockers. This prevents a number of exploits and allows you to clearly define the areas and paths that players can use to travel and fight upon.
  - The blocker tool should primarily be used for painting the border areas of the map, and not obstructions that you should be able to pass over or under.
  - Siege units cannot fire past terrain that is marked with the blocker tool.
  - A blocker model is available for the entity tool (/world/props/tools/blocker_med.mdf) which can be used to block specific areas. This model does not block ranged siege fire. The blocker model offers the advantage of very precise placement which the blocker tool lacks.
  - Impassible areas should be fully painted in with the blocker tool. If you only draw a line between areas, players will be able to place gadgets such as spawn portals behind the line and reach areas that should be off-limits.
  - Care should be taken to prevent players from accessing concave areas or plateaus at the edge of border mountains where gadgets such as spawn portals can be placed. Blockers should generally be placed a few feet up the steep edge of a mountain border to prevent players from exploiting those areas.
    - It may be preferable to use the deform tool to clean up areas where players shouldn't be able to place gadgets in addition to re-painting the area with the blocker tool.

Sand and Snow

Man-Made Objects

Natural Objects

Forming Mountains

Examples

Mountain Texturing Example 01

An example mountain texturing scheme using Rock4 on Layer 1 and Ground2 on Layer 2.

Form your mountain. You'll need to look at the other examples and guidelines for information on how to make an appropriate-looking mountain.
Apply the base texture for the surrounding terrain to the mountain and nearby area. In this example, that texture is Grass2.
Apply the main texture for the mountain to the mountain, following the shape of the mountain, on Layer 1.
Apply an intermediary texture on Layer 2 to smooth the transition between the mountain and surrounding area and provide extra detail. The texture that you choose should give the appearance of dust, dirt, rocks, snow, etc. that have slid off the side of the mountains and settled at the edges. In this case, Ground2 was chosen.
Fill in areas on the mountain where dust, rocks, debris, etc. are likely to settle. This is generally in concave areas on the mountain.
Accentuate the shadows and depressed areas on the mountain using subtle black coloring. Generally you will need to use a low-strength brush for this, usually a strength of 4-6. In this example, the coloring is somewhat hard to see, but in other cases it may be more visible (when appropriate, of course).
The final image in the gallery displays the mountain using environment lighting that enhance the appearance of the mountain. Care will be required to ensure that the surrounding terrain also looks appropriate when applying environment settings.

Download the example map to have a closer look at the structure of this style of mountain.