Tool Teragon - Random Map Generator

[Pille]

Excellent work Riamus with the documentation! And thank you for creating this thread.

Edited August 4 by Pille (see edit history)

[Riamus]

Teragon v0.50.11.0 is released.  The main change is that it will generate a checksum file that will prevent the game from using half_splat images of terrain, causing roads to look bad or disappear altogether.

 

So what are half_splat images?  They are new in 1.0 and I don't know exactly why they were added, but they are a processed image that take your road and water maps and shrink them to 50% the original size.  So an 8k map becomes 4k.  This doesn't change the map size in the game, but it does cause a loss of detail, especially for roads.  Many thin gravel roads can partially or fully disappear on your map, and if you're making your main roads be less than 100% road so that they look slightly overgrown with grass and dirt, this can make those roads look extremely patchy.  There may be a good reason for them using half_splat images, but they cause a lot of problems.  Even on my RWG map I started with in 1.0, my gravel side roads were often missing.  I could see where they were on the map, but there wasn't any gravel where the road should be.  In the forest, I could see where they *should* be because the grass decorations and stuff weren't on them, but that was the only indication where the path was as it was just the grass terrain without gravel.

 

Here is an example of what half_splats can do to roads.  And in this one, they didn't entirely disappear, but they still look really bad.  And even if you think this looks okay in the snow (snow covering the roads), it looks really out of place in the other biomes.

 

The update for Teragon should prevent the half_splat problem from happening.  If you still have problems, let us know.  You'll still run into this kind of problem with RWG, though.  Hopefully TFP will either remove halt_splats or find a way to not have this issue.

 

Note that although this does also impact rivers, rivers are usually wide enough that you won't notice.  If you had a river that was very narrow, you would probably see a patchy river as well.

Edited August 5 by Riamus (see edit history)

[spud42]

Thanks for the updates.

There are quite a few help items that are just basically a quick description of the parameter with no explanation of what the value change really does. 

Some make a huge difference by increasing by 1 some need to be increased by 1000 to see a difference.

I know documentation takes time and is a pain in the A$$ to do. so Thank you for what we already have and these updates.

 

[Riamus]

20 hours ago, spud42 said:

Thanks for the updates.

There are quite a few help items that are just basically a quick description of the parameter with no explanation of what the value change really does. 

Some make a huge difference by increasing by 1 some need to be increased by 1000 to see a difference.

I know documentation takes time and is a pain in the A$$ to do. so Thank you for what we already have and these updates.

 

If you have any specific commands in mind, feel free to list them.  Note that the descriptions are based almost entirely on just trying them.  Sometimes there just isn't a clear change so the descriptions are less.  In any case, once the comparison screenshots from the online documentation are all added, that should cover most of it.  But there will always be a need to just try stuff.

[Wolves Hero]

I made it 16k square islands worked fine but enabled 'Create Player Spawn' always crashed closed down itself they can't handle on 16k same last in January 2024 was give up. 'Create Player Spawn' have no issued on lower than 15k 🤷‍♀️

I founded disabled 'Create Player Spawn' no more crashed. I use manual spawnpoint position lists on spawnpoints.xml. I haven't make map long time last A20 from KingGen make Square Islands.

 

[Riamus]

18 minutes ago, Wolves Hero said:

I made it 16k square islands worked fine but enabled 'Create Player Spawn' always crashed closed down itself they can't handle on 16k same last in January 2024 was give up. 'Create Player Spawn' have no issued on lower than 15k 🤷‍♀️

I founded disabled 'Create Player Spawn' no more crashed. I use manual spawnpoint position lists on spawnpoints.xml. I haven't make map long time last A20 from KingGen make Square Islands.

 

You would need to share your present (preferably on discord) for someone to look into that.

[HB_H4wk]

I have a question. I created a custom height map and after the map generation is complete and I go to open it in the World Editor it shows **World Version A21.99**, so is this going to work with v 1.0?

[BestGohan]

Hi, im' news here. How to download your program ?

[Riamus]

22 hours ago, HB_H4wk said:

I have a question. I created a custom height map and after the map generation is complete and I go to open it in the World Editor it shows **World Version A21.99**, so is this going to work with v 1.0?

Any time the game updates, you have to change the version in Teragon to match.  People make maps for multiple versions, so Teragon will not change your version for you.  You can edit the map_info.xml file with the version number for your map you already made, but you should update it in Teragon for future maps.  You can use V.1.0.999 for 1.0.  I haven't looked at 1.1 experimental yet, but if you are using that, you can probably use V.1.1.999.

3 hours ago, BestGohan said:

Hi, im' news here. How to download your program ?

It can be downloaded from #downloads on discord. See the link in the first post.

[Wolves Hero]

I not yet discord. I'm test 4k map have small issue about some tiles are empty no POIs spawn & Create side roads is not worked won't generate, I use manual draw road worked well. I use all in 1 city without small town & oldwest

regular_town;1;100;center:downtown,commercial,industrial,countrytown;outskirt:rural,residential,countrytown,countryresidential;layout:maze_3;extra_link:0.3;gateway:rwg_tile_gateway_t,rwg_tile_gateway_straight,rwg_tile_gateway_straight2,rwg_tile_gateway_intersection2

 

Old Square Island feel bit small on islands, I make bit wide island more city.

 

[Riamus]

41 minutes ago, Wolves Hero said:

I not yet discord. I'm test 4k map have small issue about some tiles are empty no POIs spawn & Create side roads is not worked won't generate, I use manual draw road worked well. I use all in 1 city without small town & oldwest

regular_town;1;100;center:downtown,commercial,industrial,countrytown;outskirt:rural,residential,countrytown,countryresidential;layout:maze_3;extra_link:0.3;gateway:rwg_tile_gateway_t,rwg_tile_gateway_straight,rwg_tile_gateway_straight2,rwg_tile_gateway_intersection2

 

Old Square Island feel bit small on islands, I make bit wide island more city.

 

Since you do squares like that instead of a normal map, use Create Single Town instead of Create Towns.  Do that for each square.  And maybe increase minimum town size for the regular_town if needed.

 

I can see side roads on your screenshot.  Are those all manual?  If the Create Side Roads command isn't working, you would need to provide your present and files that you are importing on discord for us to test it and find the problem.

[Wolves Hero]

1 hour ago, Riamus said:

Since you do squares like that instead of a normal map, use Create Single Town instead of Create Towns.  Do that for each square.  And maybe increase minimum town size for the regular_town if needed.

 

I can see side roads on your screenshot.  Are those all manual?  If the Create Side Roads command isn't working, you would need to provide your present and files that you are importing on discord for us to test it and find the problem.

 I manual side roads but Create side Roads won't automatic generate side roads not worked. I never heard Create Single Town new released first time, I try on Create Single Town for Old West town on desert only 1 spawn can't multi spawn like normal create town. 5x Create Single Town make 5 cities.

Edited August 15 by Wolves Hero (see edit history)

[Riamus]

43 minutes ago, Wolves Hero said:

 I manual side roads but Create side Roads won't automatic generate side roads not worked. I never heard Create Single Town new released first time, I try on Create Single Town for Old West town on desert only 1 spawn can't multi spawn like normal create town. 5x Create Single Town make 5 cities.

Yes, that is why it is create "single" town and why I said to do it for each square.  It will work better than trying to hope towns get placed in every location on such a map.

 

Even so, your squares are small and if a town is not generated in a specific way, it may still not fill the entire square, including leaving large sections unfilled.  That is the risk of trying to generate a random town in a small, specific space.

Edited August 16 by Riamus (see edit history)

[Wolves Hero]

I have issued about terrain look rough big step not smooth slopes on Teragon. I was done 4k 8k 12k 16k Square Island maps maker, I tested in games founded terrain not smooth slopes. Can't find any fix terrain.

 

[Riamus]

2 hours ago, Wolves Hero said:

I have issued about terrain look rough big step not smooth slopes on Teragon. I was done 4k 8k 12k 16k Square Island maps maker, I tested in games founded terrain not smooth slopes. Can't find any fix terrain.

 

If you use a custom heightmap that you either made yourself it is a real world heightmap and it is 8bit instead of 16bit, you are going to have that problem.  8bit does not provide enough gray shades to have smooth terrain in this game.  Every shade in 8bit is 1m, so you are jumping up 1m at a time on slope instead of evenly the way it would with 16bit.

 

You will either need to do a lot of smoothing (filter gaussian blur) which will smooth that out somewhat but will also smooth out everything else as well, or use an image editing app to manually fix the heightmap, or just make/get a new 16bit heightmap to use.  Or let Teragon make your terrain for you.

[Wolves Hero]

55 minutes ago, Riamus said:

If you use a custom heightmap that you either made yourself it is a real world heightmap and it is 8bit instead of 16bit, you are going to have that problem.  8bit does not provide enough gray shades to have smooth terrain in this game.  Every shade in 8bit is 1m, so you are jumping up 1m at a time on slope instead of evenly the way it would with 16bit.

 

You will either need to do a lot of smoothing (filter gaussian blur) which will smooth that out somewhat but will also smooth out everything else as well, or use an image editing app to manually fix the heightmap, or just make/get a new 16bit heightmap to use.  Or let Teragon make your terrain for you.

 

Yeah I founded filter gaussian blur I put 3.0 make more smooth. Re-generator again all maps but wilderness POIs stay same seeds they keep random spawn places when changed value on filter gaussian blur then manual side roads again halfway done.

[Riamus]

29 minutes ago, Wolves Hero said:

 

Yeah I founded filter gaussian blur I put 3.0 make more smooth. Re-generator again all maps but wilderness POIs stay same seeds they keep random spawn places when changed value on filter gaussian blur then manual side roads again halfway done.

Yes, things are placed based on terrain and other features.  Keeping the same seed only works if nothing changes.

 

I am not sure what you mean about side roads.

Edited August 20 by Riamus (see edit history)

[MrSamuelAdams]

Question, if I want to make a map but include all the POIs from my LocalPrefabs and Mods folder how do I make sure they are included in the generation?