Matrix Games Forums

Would the Armored Brigade map be able to handle great changes of elevation over short distances i.e. mountainous terrain?

I wondered about Norway's fjords, where the sea finds its way between huge mountains.

I haven't tried, but I believe the answer is yes. There does seem to be a limit to how sharp cliffs can be, and I don't think 90 degrees (or more) is possible, but it will change relatively sharply.

And I'm not sure if my reading of it is correct, but from what I understand the elevation map goes in 1m increments and can handle 255x255 colours = 65025m elevation variance, which is a lot more than is actually found on earth [:)]

For what it's worth, I'm pretty sure that my Chechnya map (only parts of which are currently finished/released) has over 1km elevation differences, and seems to work fine.

If angle is too steep, then AB game engine will recognize area as impossible geometry, so this will be depicted as no-go zone (viewed as rocky terrain tile in game). It is better to escape from too steep terrain.

Except this, I think all will be fine in AB game engine.

Excellent news.

Thank you for your answers, Gentlemen.

Also for what it's worth, I'm currently working on a Vietnamese map with a section of the Chu Pong Massif... unless I'm going something wrong with converting the heightmap, it does not handle it well lol. The entire massif area is no-go zone, as well as some of the other smaller hilly/mountainous dips in elevation.

I had some similar problems with an SRTM heightmap of Fort Benning, GA. I found that a small Gaussian blur applied to the elevation data in QGIS doesn't distort the elevation very much, and makes a great deal more terrain accessible to Armored Brigade.