L3DT Map Making

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1 Exporting to RoR
2 Update 5/12

Tutorial was written in early 2007 and is well out of date. If anyone figures out easy ways to get the LUA files written feel free to edit - iriquois

I can't remember where exactly I found this program, but I think it was on the old forum. I know that the volcano map was made with this program.

L3DT is great because it does most of the mapping for you. You draw in a 16x16 pixel elevation map of sorts, then apply erosion, terraces, plateau, and all kinds of other effects. Then you hit calculate, and it spits out a fully formed map. This is great if you don't have either a lot of time, or an exact idea of what you want. The program takes a sketch of the place and turns it into a fully formed map. This sucks when the program spits out something you don't want, because it's almost impossible to wrestle it into what you do.

First, go to [1] and download L3DT 2.9 Standard Edition, (or buy the commercial version, if you really want to). Install the program and open it.

Click the button titled "new map". You will get a pop-up asking how you want to make your map. In this case, I will be using Design/Inflate. You can start with the blank one if you want. After selecting one, click okay. The next window, number 2 of four, is titled "Design map size". set the map size to 16x16. This means a 1024x1024 RAW, so there will be minimal change after exporting. After you set the map size, make sure to change the Heightfield resolution to 3 meters. You will see the map size change from 10kmx10km to 3.1x3.1. That's around the size Rigs of Rods uses.

Next up is design map parameters. There's a bunch of sliders controlling a bunch of different stuff. Change the sliders to what you want, or just randomly. Don't forget to change the default climate. Hit next when done.

Finally is the box Calculation Queue. Make sure you have only checked "Design Map", other wise the program won't give you a chance to see what you may be getting. Hit OK.

Soon after, you should get a green and brown and blue design map. Lighter colours means higher up. If you want to play with your map, and you probably do, click the pencil tool on the tool bar up top. Play with the tools and make some changes. I was satisfied with what it gave me. Once you're done playing with your design map, hit the Calc button up top. It's three green arrows. After you hit it, calculation queue should come up again. Check "Heightfield" and hit OK. The little box comes up that flashes colours and moves around, saying stuff at the top. This is one of the longest processes. It's making you your heightmap. When it's done you'll get a B&W map with contour lines on it. And no, I have no idea what those little green and red and blue lines mean. They seem to be the contour lines of the heightmap, and may be representing the height of the terrain.

If you like the way your heightfield looks, hit the Calc button again. If not, go to View -> Show Map -> Design Map, make changes and calculate the heightfield again. Do so until it looks good. If you're satisfied with the result, hit the Calc button. Your good friend, the Calculation Queue, comes up again. At this point, I just check all the remaining boxes, because they won't make a huge change any ways. I leave the water flooding panel alone. Hit next. I don't know what water table modelling is. Hit next. Light mapping I leave alone, because it's minor. Hit next. Next again for page 2 of light mapping. Next for page three of light related stuff. For texture settings, the only thing I usually change is the High Resolution texture option. I almost always set it to 2. Hit OK. The box pops back up, and you wait. I usually walk away from the computer and get something to drink. Texture always takes quite a while to get.

At the end, it displays your texture map.

Once the map is created, go to file->save->save project as and enter a name for your map. Once that's done, you can now explore it in full 3D, texture and all using the sapphire plugin. (You can access this by going to the extensions tab.)

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Exporting to RoR

Finding the specified files is hard, so you can find them here : https://rapidshare.com/files/3062305624/L3DT_tutorial_template.zip in that .zip file you will find all of the files you need to use. Because I'm so nice they are already named for you. There is also a readme in there that contains a few tips.

To convert your map for use in Rigs of Rods, you will have to first copy the files from the aspen map, aspen.cfg, aspen.jpg, aspen.raw, and aspen.terrn. I put these in a new folder, and renamed them mymap1.xxx. Go into mymap.terrn, and remove everything. Replace with:

My map
mymap.cfg
0.93, 0.86, 0.76
1828,15,2198.75,  1964,15,2140, 1818,15,2200
end

After that's done, open mymap.cfg in your favorite text editor. I use notepad++ (http://notepad-plus.sourceforge.net/uk/site.htm) Find the lines circled in Red, and replace those with what is shown. The part circled in green is the total height of the map. To get the green number, I go into L3DT and go to operations->height Field-> change vert scale. Take the non-negative version of the min altitude and add it to the max altitude. Replace the number circled in green in the cfg file and replace it with this value. That makes sure your map isn't stretched or deformed.

At this point, all we have to do is make a .raw and a texture file, then put them into RoR!

To make a RAW, in L3DT go view->show map->Height field. Next to go to file->export->active map. You get a pop-up. Change file format to RAW, and hit the re-size button. Change 1024 to 1025. Because L3DT is so awesome, for the name hit browse and select your renamed aspen.raw file. It'll rewrite it with this one, so you don't have to move anything. Hit save, then OK. You now have a working .raw file.

To get your texture map, go to view->show map-> texture map. then file->export->active map. Tell it to export as a .jpg, then use browse to find your old texture. hit OK.

Move all of these files back into your data/terrains/ folder. You now should have a working version of your map, in RoR. You may have to change the spawn locations of your character and your cars, b/c they could be spawning in the ground. Do this in your mymap.terrn folder. Change the second and third strings of numbers, specifically the second number in the string.

The last thing you need is a mymap-mini.png. It's a 256x256 scaled down version of your texture file.

I got it in game, no problems.

Update 5/12

To get water into the map at it's sea level, add this line into your file:

My map
mymap.cfg
w 101
0.93, 0.86, 0.76
1828,15,2198.75,  1964,15,2140, 1818,15,2200
end

replace the number 101 with the min altitude from the vertical heightfield scale box.

edit by 3dracer01 a question from dmtactical Q: "Hey I have a question about making maps. I made a map in L3DT using the tutorial and it tells me my RAW size "doesn't agree with configuration settings."

"Have you had this error before?"

A: "Yes, your settings in L3DT need to be 1025x1025 only L3DT puts it in 1024x1024.

To force your map to be 1025x1025 go to operations>heightfield>resize heightfield and there you go."

now in your config in RoR it has to look like this: