Scourge of War Boards

apologies if this has been addressed elsewhere but is it possible to make a map from scratch as a mod?
if so has anyone posted advice\tutorials on the subject?its something id like to look into. cheers

Map making it is not possible at this time. However we have a special team of talented map makers that are working on maps that will be released free of charge. You've probably seen their posts with screenshots in the forum. See this announcement for more info:

http://www.norbsoftdev.net/index.php/ar ... w-map-team

thans lp.so, is it then possible to edit already existing maps i.e change buildings,fences etc?
im thinking here of the napoleonic mod,so we could make a more 'european'feeling map or maps to play on. the objective of course is to have maps of the actual battlefields of the period and to have scenarios like the main game. cheers

There are some things you can edit on the current maps. The Kansas Map and the Alpine map have both received facelifts and are available as mods. I'm no map expert, so one of the map guys are better to chime in here.

thanks lp.i would appreciate anyone with the knowledge giving me the heads up on this.cheers

Well lets see, i'm not a mapping guru, to edit the maps.

You will need a program like GIMP, this is for making new terrain sprites, rocks, etc. You can also use the color picker to change the grayscale colors in the C:\NorbSoftDev\Scourge of War\Gettysburg\Base\Maps\mapname.bmp grayscales, as these grayscales represent woods, fields, stonewalls, etc.




***Do the following only on copies of the original files!!!!!!!***




The mapname.csv file shows what grayscale colors that are for woods and what grayscale colors are for fields, etc.

You can not change 3-D objects like houses, large rocks, most fences, and you can not change the road net. You can add stone walls though.

Put changed file you name yourself, into a new folder you name yourself, in the Mods folder in SOWG, and work those files from there.

Do small changes at first so you know what to change back to when you crash the game, and you will crash the sooner or later.

Probably the best info to get you started is in the SDK Section 4.6 - FOLDER – MAPS ( pg. 67 )

Like i said im not "the" mapping guy here, hope this helps some.

*S*

thanks for the reply texas.i was hoping that new buildings were possible but who knows?
perhaps norb and the team may enable that one day. cheers

Well let me answer this. No you can not add fences and objects! No you can not change the sky, or any other elements of the maps. You can change the .bmp and csv files for Kansas and Alpine maps and that is it. What these files contol is the texture files, how many, and where they are placed on the map. If you want more maps... well let me tell you.. I was hired by NSD to make em and I have three done. As soon as Antietam is finished there will be a major patch update and our new maps will be released. You would not believe the major overhaul of the current system we are doing. Norb is reworking how the game reads graphics files so we can add more and the game will run a hell of a lot smoother. I cant tell you more than that, but if you want to mod the map on your own, you can at least change where and the density of the terrain, and thats it for now. Dont worry, any of you guys, The reason for all the delays is the new patch, and it required a lot of programming. You all will be satisfied and happy. Trust Me!
-J

thanks again tex.this is why i love this game!if other developers were as far sighted as this team (finantial and publisher requirements not withstanding) their product would far exceed what they have now.
the ability to mod this means far more people will buy it.my own experience confirms it as mates of mine are going to purchase the game over other less accurate titles such as ntw etc. cheers