How-To: Making Waterfalls in Company of Heroes Maps
WARNING! Waterfalls take a lot of time to make and are very costly on memory. Keep this in mind if you're going to make a map with a lot of objects. Use at your own risk!
Introduction:
Many ideas for maps have already been used, making it harder to come up with original maps. I recently started a map for ZombieMod featuring 2 waterfalls to make the map stand out a lot. I felt that this is something that should be brought to other standard maps, so I am writing this tutorial.
I expect you to have a basic working knowledge of Worldbuilder to use this tutorial.
Objectives:
1) Learn how to make waterfalls for Company of Heroes using Worldbuilder
2) Discover some practical uses for waterfalls
3) State problems with waterfalls on Company of Heroes Maps.
Tools Needed:
1) Worldbuilder
2) Imagination
3) Patience
Getting Started:
Let's begin by opening up Worldbuilder for Company of Heroes. Make a new map (or open a map you are working on. If you do this, save often!).
Now that you have your map open, click the height tool. Set the mode to "Set Height", and make the height 12. This should make a nice medium-small waterfall. Any brush size will work.
Ok, now that you have that set, start by making a large mound for the top of the waterfall
Next step is to do increments down to your base height. We'll do steps of 12, 11.6, 11.3, 11, 10.5 and back to 10. This guarantees a smooth waterfall. You can experiment with steeper waterfalls as you wish.
Now that you have your basic shape, make spots for the water. To do this, set your height to a number lower than the level of the waterfall. I.E. - for 12, set the height to 10, for 11.6, set it to 9, etc
Now fill in each level with water. Bring it as high to the brim as possible. NOTE! If you fill it to the brim, but it covers the whole map, you made a mistake somewhere and that level is not totally enclosed. Check all of your edits to see if there's a hole somewhere in your height editing. You can also apply some water texture so it looks like it is moving.
Now you can add details by using tiles, splats, rock objects, etc.
The very last step is adding fog to make it look like the water is really gushing. This is optional, but i think it makes it look a lot better and more realistic. To do this, we shall use action markers and put in a fog effect. For more information, look up the action marker tutorial.
And that about does it. Now you can edit the rest of the map around the waterfalls.
Some tips:
1) Higher distances between 2 water sources usually means more steep rise. However, after a certain point, it does not reach all the way, making it look silly.
2) Using multiple FX markers will make your waterfall look better.
3) Make the water flow fast on your map, so it looks like the current is strong over the waterfalls.
Uses:
1) Add detail to your map - the waterfall fills up a lot of space.
2) It's creative! Only 1 map I know of so far has waterfalls, and it's mine
3) Adds tactical depth - a waterfall prevents units from moving across that area.
Limitations:
1) Since it is a bug, it is not perfect. Don't blame me, blame Relic
2) It cannot do vertical waterfalls.
Problems:
1) Requires a lot of memory if you have reflections turned on!
Conclusion:
I hope this tutorial has been of some use to all you mappers out there! Enjoy, and I look forwards to what you can make with this.
- BDNY
