The Mapmaking Guild F.A.Q.s

Maps and the art of mapmaking.
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Kalah
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The Mapmaking Guild F.A.Q.s

Unread postby Kalah » 27 Nov 2005, 22:24

Answers for many of the questions people have about maps for their Heroes games.

General

I just made a map/campaign. How can I get it onto the Celestial Heavens site?
- First of all, you need to make sure it's well-tested. We don't want low-quality crap ;) Also, your name and email address, map size/version, number of players total, and if it is a co-op or not, are required information in a text file accompanying the map in a zip file. The names of at least two maptesters are also necessary. This page lays out all the details, and includes a readme file template to use.

How do I find maptesters for my map/campaign?
- Asking on this forum is one way. Say a little something about your map (size, game version) and that you would like it tested, and somebody usually replies. You can also submit your map to the Maptester Matchmaking service on Celestial Heavens for others to test.

What do the different abbreviations after the game titles mean?
They stand for the different versions of games:
- H2 SW: Heroes II, the Succession Wars - the original version of H2
- H2 PL: Heroes II, the Price of Loyalty - the expansion to H2
- H3 RoE: Heroes III, Restoration of Erathia - the original version of H3
- H3 AB: Heroes III, Armageddon's Blade - the first expansion to H3
- H3 SoD: Heroes III, Shadow of Death - the second expansion to H3, and prequel to RoE and AB
- H4 Std: Heroes IV, no title in particular, therefore often called the "Standard" (Std.) version
- H4 GS: Heroes IV, the Gathering Storm - the first expansion to H4
- H4 WoW: Heroes IV, the Winds of War - the second expansion to H4
- Heroes V has no special title
- H5: HoF: Heroes V, Hammers of Fate - the first expansion to H5

Heroes 4

What are the best Heroes IV maps?
- Celestial Heavens hosts many high-quality maps, including reviews for most of them. They are all available for download on our site. This Russian site also has a list of maps, though perhaps not of equal quality. Another great pointer would be our map reviewer Psychobabble's picks.

Where can I find some user-made campaigns? I can't seem to locate any.
- On Celestial Heavens, the campaigns are mixed among the regular maps. Even though H5 has been released, people still make campaigns for H4. You can find the complete list and artwork on the Campaigns page.

Where is the help file for the Map Editor?
- Version 3.0 of Heroes 4 comes with a help file. That includes the unpatched Winds of War expansion pack, or Genesis of a New World or The Gathering Storm patched up to version 3.0. The patches are available from this page.

How do I know what the HoMM4 artefacts do? There are no right-click descriptions!
- Check out Celestial Heavens' artefact page.

I am creating a campaign, and I want to have the same Heroes in each scenario, like in the official NWC campaigns. How can I do this?
- If you go into the Characters -> Heroes tab in the map editor, the last choice will be a gray Hero called a Carryover Hero. Place this on the second, third, etc. maps and enter either the name or the relative strength (strongest, weakest hero etc.) of the Hero you would like to take that spot when that scenario begins.

I tried playing my map and (something on it) did not work properly. How do I know if the map is playable?
- See the latest updates on patches and expansions on this (or another) forum. One bug fixed in the patches, for instance, is the unplayability of maps with the Emerald Longbow and a Random Major Artifact.

Where's the Random Map Generator?
- Heroes 4 and its expansions do not include an RMG. However, the H4Util (check below) now includes a form of RMG.

I can't find Hexis' castle anywhere in the editor! How can I place it on a map?
- It's one of the many objects in the Tools -> Customize -> Object Palettes menu. Double click on one of the palette names to the right to bring up the list of objects, then scan down the list until you see miscellaneous_Dark_Castle. Drag it over to the palette you want it in. Of course, you have to have the TGS or WoW editor.

I'm creating a map and I own The Gathering Storm (TGS) or Winds of War (WoW). Is there any way to let owners of the original (Standard version) game play my map?
- One option is to install Heroes 4 (original) and create the map there. However, if you already started, H4Util has the feature (among others) to convert TGS or WoW maps into .h4c files (original Heroes IV format).

I have attempted to use Slava's H4Util to convert my TGS/WoW map into H4 Original, yet I cannot get it to work. What do I do?
- Simply create a shortcut to the extractor file and then right-click select properties. In the Target section put this after the quotes: -wv1 [map name].h4c

Why didn't you put (insert question here) on the list?
- I either forgot it or figured it wasn't important. You can send me (Kalah) a private message, or reply to this thread, and I may add it on. After the questions are added from replies, the replies will be deleted, as they are no longer useful.

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