Hey, I want to create my own multiplayer Strategy map, but I don't know what tools are available for this. What do you guys recommend?
ODLwinter.exe
For that you need an image editing program. Hell you don't even need ODLwinter, it just makes symetrical or shimple shape maps easier to make.
All you NEED is the bz2 editor.
The BZ2 editor cheat?
It was never a cheat so much that it was a hidden feature...
The reason the ORIGINAL way was to turn it on via the game.cheat in the console was that it is already coded to let you toggle those settings in SP ONLY!!! (Under normal circumstances)
Post 1.2 It was moved to it's own .exe (bz2edit.exe) and to open the editor you just run that, navigate to your map as you would in bzone.exe (the normal game) and
once in-map press the good ol' ctrl + e (That is pressing "Ctrl" and "E" simultaneously for those who dont know, and not pressing Ctrl, +, and e.)
HOWEVER, It should be known that using odl1winter.exe IS a viable option BUT ONLY to set up the terrain, basic color and alpha channels of the colors.
YOU MUST STILL USE THE INGAME EDITOR TO PLACE OBJECTS (pools, spawnpoints, scrap), WATER, AND TO TEXTURE YOUR MAPS.
You can use winter to do most of the texturing work too, Winter can save you months of work if you use it imaginatively.
winter i can use, the programs to make images for winter... i cannot.
If you want your map to look real-life and personal to your design, make it using the editor. Don't use Winter unless you are having trouble starting it or if you want to change something big (like map size, or if you are having trouble making the map symmetrical).
Nah, winter does an excellent job. I do recommend that you make a SUPER rough copy of your intended map design, export the shellmap, process it into layers using winter, do graphics stuff on it, then use winter to save it back into a BZN file.
I'd say winter is good for big changes only. Once you got the big stuff down, then you can feel free to add extra love into your map by tweaking the little things.
I think its great for getting through the rough work that takes allot of time to do in the editor, you can develop the basic layout, flat ground and hills.
You can paint textures into defined areas and on specific layers and colour the map in a way that is just not possible in the editor. After that you then do fine adjustments in the editor. It leaves you with time to do the things many people don't bother to do to maps, like make nice sky domes, pools that match the terrain and props to place on the map.
My favourite technique is with painting the map. After you get all the lighting set up how you want it, just take a colour.bmp with winter, adjust it, paint the map with it. Take a shellmap picture of it (May need to change the lighting to get it to come out well, and remove the edgepath), modify this to your liking, paint the map with it, set the lighting back to how you wanted it...Wow! now all the hills have shadows painted on in the right places and your map looks realistic even with lights on none and even better with them on full.
Give your map the paintjob it deserves with winter!
Oh yes, maps with manually done lighting (where the terrain is shaded) look super polished.
Quote from: mrtwosheds on July 23, 2009, 11:03:55 PM
Give your map the paintjob it deserves with winter!
Exactly what I meant by using Winter for everything not object-oriented. (What do you mean by being able to texture with winter anyway, thought you could only set color.)
I recently used winter on and off to create a map, but the majority of the work was done by me in the editor.
i used winter to make it as symetrical as possible, as i did the first corner of the map first and it looked great. I did all the colouring in winter. Theres missed areas but still...
Textures i prefered to do in the editor, but thats because i was using the textures to semi-object like terrain (like large trees, base areas, natural walls etc).
Quote(What do you mean by being able to texture with winter anyway, thought you could only set color.)
I mean using alphamap layers 1-3. Make a greyscale texture with the lighter areas being the places where you want a texture painted and the black areas clear. You can import and export these too and from maps with winter.
Create them from the height map to apply rocky textures to hilltops or sand to flat areas, or from the normals map to texture slopes.
:-o, I never knew that... Thanks for the Info Twosheds.
Maps look better when you don't have huge globs of the same texture thrown around. I like going around with the editor and making shadows and things myself. That's just the way I see it.
Winter, to me, is for things like resizing the map or making it symmetrical in the VERY beginning of making your map, not making little changes here and there to "polish" it.
I haven't figure out how to use it yet, but it looks ideal for making custom looking maps with special terrain features like contoured terrain from photo based images and such. Perhaps, someone could post a sample tutorial or Two based on how they use Winter to create such maps?
I had some experience with C&C on making custom maps from BMP images, but it's version of a map editor supported this internally. Winter, is a third party utility that can be used with BZII, but instructions on how to actually apply it are somewhat of a mystery except the few peeps that have figured out how to use it. A little help please?
Its functions are fairly straight forward, its how you use them that makes a difference.
Just open any map, in ODL1winter and click the export all button, this will give you 6 .bmp that define that map. This should give you some idea of what each one does.
You then just have to get creative with your graphics program.
1. Make a height map, experiment with it and the height settings in winter, until you get a terrain roughly the shape you want it.
2. Texture it with just 4 textures. (define them in the .trn file and paint the whole layer in the editor)
One very ordinary one for layer 0 (that has a pool to match) the base layer that is not altered by ODL1winter.
Use the next most dominant texture, like a rocky one, for layer 1
Use another for layer 2, like sand or grass
Use the 3rd one for another more decorative texture .
If I want more than 4 textures I usually put them on layer 3 making sure they don't meet anywhere, but don't bother to do this yet.
Save and export all with winter.
3.I would then take the heightMap .bmp and use it to modify the alphamap layers 1 and 2, so the rocky texture is only painted on the hills, the sand where it is flat, and the layer 3 texture wherever you want it.
Use the editor to fine tune the texture placements, making sure to use only the one texture on each layer. Or use your graphics program to make more complicated patterns of textures.
I made a nice effect on one of my maps, using 2 different but similar rocky textures on layers 1 and 2, by making a sort of checkered pattern on one alphamap and inverting it on the other, so the textures alternated along and up a hill.
For layer 3 you may well want to paint it after the others in the editor, placing the other different textures where you want them over the other 3 and making small height adjustments to the terrain.
Now your map is textured in a way that can be altered easily and all the complex stuff is on one layer only (3).
After you have the height and textures how you want them, then go to the console and spend a few hours or days setting up the lighting, fog, dome , clouds etc etc. to get you map looking the way you want it to. Only after this would I bother with the color of the map, using the technique I described above. And if you used colour textures, that technique will paint them all the right colour too, but you may need to desaturate or adjust the colour map to get it looking good.
(http://www.bzcomplex.com/gallery/albums/userpics/10062/terrainlite.png)
Where would I put ground textures that I have made for use in say Dunes. Also can I use a bitmap or does it have to be something else?
Put your textures in addon, or the maps folder, or your pak file.
Winter likes bitmaps for making the map, but dxtbz2 is best for the actual in game textures.
2sheds couldn't be more right about doing colouring AFTER you've done the skydome and lighting.
Thanks, MTS for posting the how to on using ODL1Winter. Really helps when someone points out and explains a few key points. I'd really like to learn the height map part to make a few image style maps where the image defines the contours of the map itself. I don't really understand layer's but I guess they must some how be somewhat transparent to blend the different textures used in a typical BZ map. BNG.
QuoteI don't really understand layer's but I guess they must some how be somewhat transparent to blend the different textures used in a typical BZ map
Layer 0 is solid texture this is the one you see on low terrain detail.
Layer 1 is drawn on top of it, in full white (255 255 255) areas its texture will be solid, in full black (0 0 0) it will be invisible.
Layer 2 is drawn on top of 0 and 1
Layer 3 is drawn on top of 0, 1 and 2.
It can get really confusing in the editor because you can paint any number of textures on any one layer and quickly wind up with a confusing mix of different textures on different layers. If you just stick to one texture per layer at the start it becomes much easier to track what is where later on.
I always try to layer textures in a logical way, a very plain texture on 0, rock on 1, then soil or sand on 2 and grass or snow or whatever on 3.