descr_aerial_map_ground_types.txt

descr_aerial_map_ground_types.txt controls which textures are shown on the campaign map for the various climate types. Note that changes made in this file only effect the appearence of the campaign map - this file has no effect on the battle map appearance.

In vanilla RTW/BI the file is only found in the RTW/data folder, an amended copy can be placed in BI/data or modfolder/data and will be read from there without affecting the other installed games.

Typical vanilla segment:

climate highland
{
	cultivated_low		temperate_grassland_farm.tga	arctic.tga
	cultivated_medium	temperate_grassland_farm.tga	arctic.tga
	cultivated_high		temperate_grassland_farm.tga	arctic.tga
	fertility_low		alpine.tga						arctic.tga
	fertility_medium	alpine.tga						arctic.tga
	fertility_high		alpine.tga						arctic.tga
	forest_dense		texture1.tga					arctic.tga
	forest_sparse		texture1.tga					arctic.tga
	hills				texture1_hilly.tga				arctic.tga
	mountains_high		temperate_mountain_small.tga	arctic.tga
	mountains_low		temperate_hills_small.tga		arctic.tga
	swamp				swamp.tga						 arctic.tga
	beach				beach.tga
	scorched			scorched.tga
}

if no other path is specified the game will look in RTW/data/terrain/aerial_map/ground_types or modfolder/data/packs/mod_0.pak for the specified tgas.

The cultivated settings are activated when a farm is built in the region, changing the tga specified on those lines can remove the sometimes unattractive farming overlay, or restrict it to just high fertility areas.

The second tga listed, where applicable is the one used for the winter view of the campaign map. That example shows that the vanilla game uses the same tga for multiple uses.

If new textures are made they can be added individually to the different fertility or ground types to increase variety.

Adding more climates

For RTW there doesn't seem to be any way of adding an entirely new climate that will work on the battle map. However some climates are not specified separately in this file in vanilla. So for instance a new section can be added for

climate swamp
{
	cultivated_low	...etc	
}

to help give variety for climates that otherwise default to the default settings.

Existing climates that can probably be given separate listings (needs confirmation) include;

• temperate_grassland_fertile
• temperate_grassland_infertile
• temperate_forest_open
• temperate_forest_deep
• swamp
  

note that the climate often refered to as Mediterranean actually uses the "test" climate settings.

Paths from Mod-Folder

For RTW/BI to add new campaign map textures in mod folder either:

pack new textures on path data/terrain/aerial_map/ground_types into mod_0.pak and place pack in mod_folder/data/packs, or

change paths in the text file to:

../../../../mod_folder_location/data/terrain/aerial_map/ground_types/.... .tga

NOTE: In Medieval II this step becomes obsolete. Just place your new textures in your 'modfolder\data\terrain\aerial_map', but you don't have to add the modfolder path in the descr_aerial_map_ground_types.txt. The engine always checks your modfolder first, so 'newtexture.tga' will do