Staredit Network

Random Terrain Script Maker:


If any of you have ever played Age of Empires, Age of Kings, or Age of Mythology you will know about these random scripts for maps, which activate when you start a selected style of map. There is a script running to create those maps for every time, and you can create your own using it.

It works very similar to programming code, and in fact, could be seen as a programming code, although limited.

However i was thinking on the idea of Starcraft. Now i'm sure it would be possible, however hard to complete, just requiring a program to run it, taking the tilesets and making the maps depending on the script used for the program. But would it be worth it? Would people really use it, or just mess around and then stop and say, hang on this is pointless!

Should i give this more thought and check out hte details, and talk to others on it or not?

I think that will requiere modding... but.. im not a programmer as well so... that could be an very interesting thing to add! Good idea!

I know better than to say you are the only one to have thought of this, but I think there was some issues of complexity that prevented one from being made to date (to my knowledge). I think there would be some use for random terrain, say as a base for RPG maps or to make a fresh melee playing arena each game. I just yoink someone else's obscure or crappy melee map or one of blizzard's as a base for "random" terrain and start messing it up so its unrecognizable, but it would be far more convenient to have a program or script do that job for me instead of me spending 5-15 minutes myself to produce just 1.

So yeah, I'd use it if you made one.

Well; first of all, i know others have thought on this idea, but have said, nope can't do, won't do it!

The problem lays in creating a programming to effectively store all the correct variables, functions, modules and such that i allow to be used, and then through that designing a map based around it.

I'm not looking to enable players to join "Random Map" and then have it do it just as they are about to play, but rather in the design stage, either making a RPG possible, a Melee map, or something else. The easiest would be a Money Map, though its not hard to make yourself.

Whats needed:
Programs;
Script Editor
Script Compiler

The Editor would allow you to create the "Random Scripts", because i would make it so you can write them yourself.
Also since most peopel wouldn't understand it, i'd have another tool, working similar to Red Alert, where you add key features you'd want in a map, and it makes them, thus User Friendly.

These would be linked and so not hard to master, once i got passed the stage of linking the relevent data streams, like the Tileset, to position, following random, but organised uses. It would likely be made into a *.chk file first, and then converted to the other versions when possible. Hopefully it wouldn't crash in the editors, i'd have to make sure it worked the files correctly.

Issues would lay in the fact, that it might not like how i placed it, i'd have to do research into the placement of terrain on maps, maybe including Units and Doodads, and how to work that into a script for myself to write out, and allow for edits. Basically once i can get a script for each one that determines the tileset, i can make it work on positions.

The Compiler would be the part that takes this script to make that damn map! Either you make it follow your set style of commands, or ones i've already made and it will use that to make it, within itself, and then hopefully work! And there is your Random Map.

Those two programs wouldn't be hard to do, its the background parts, of researching the types of tileset, how it is placed, the basic units, and your doodads, and then working on the script, then making the compiler, getting it to appear in Staredit, and then working on the position, tilesets movements and such...

Don't even think to expect anything in the near future, this is going to be a project i will carry out over time, hopefully the Starcraft Market will still be here!

wow, random terrain?
that would be pretty cool for some melee maps, and even better for some ums maps! If it had different themes (city,desert,alien world), then it would be soooooooooooooo cool!

I know a good chunk of programming, so I;ll try and help...

What i need to do first is get all the relevant data materials and corresponding files and data libraries linked to how Starcraft uses the Terrain, how it creates it, and how to edit with it.

Then i'd need to create the program to basically follow the future commands, so when you wanted to set the default to Dirt using code like this

set Dirt(main);

It would be able to understand it and write it up. Once this was done, i'd have to work out myself how to make a basic and advanced script for others to use. Also maybe include a debugging tool to aid people.

You could do it like how Team 17 did it for Worms 3D. Basically, have different sets of predefined terrain that when meshed together like a puzzle give a particular map. How the map is meshed together is determined by a seed number (that you can randomly generate). That way, all you need to do is make lots of these terrian "puzzle pieces" that are fit together with the program.

The only problem with this is that you'll have to figure out how to make the terrain look realistic without it looking like a grid.

Although i like your interesting, thats a limited view, people wouldn't want to use it in mass like that system. I am going for designing random Melee maps, RPG styled maps, and such.

Play AOM, get the add-on read the guide to make Random Map on it and you'll understand!

I was thinking about this the other day. If you could use something like this and it had options like in Sim City. Like river, waterfront, percent of mountains, water, valleys, that would be very very very useful and I think that it woudl even be implemented into Starforge or any other good map editor. THis would be a very good and useful idea.

It would be almost impossible to implenment it into other editors as an add-on package, because one, it would be very large, and secondly i doubt StarForge would work with it at first, the way i am looking at it, you can view the created maps with anything.

Hell with this system i could create an algorithym to protect your maps from almost everything, even allow advanced protection techniques.