How EXACTLY does "Fill with Symbols" work?
madwizard523
Newcomer
I can't seem to get anything useful out of it and I can't make heads or tails out of the "Help" article. Does anyone know what each of the settings actually does? I've tried experimenting and learned nothing.
Comments
I feel certain there's a video walking through this. I'm not where I can search right now, but someone here will know.
It will fill with the symbols you choose. One of the keys is selecting the number of symbols. This is important, because if you choose a bunch of areas, it will split the symbols across all of them.
Make sure you choose the size of the symbol.
I always mess with the settings. Then SAVE it. Then choose load each time Otherwise I find it gets messed up and sometime goes to default.
You can shoose random rotations and random variation in size.
I learned this all by trial and error.
Most often this command is used as a preset in conjunction with a drawing tool. These closely packed forest area drawing tools in the Mike Schley Overland style use this command. You pick the tool and draw the shape on your map the same way you would draw a normal polygon, complete the polygon by right clicking once and it fills with trees.
Add more trees by hand the usual way around the edge to make it look more natural.
There is a detailed and a full explanation of how it all works starting on page 160 of the Tome of Ultimate Mapping. Do you have the Tome?
There is also an article by Remy Monsen as well.
Command of the Week - Fill with Symbols (Week 50) — ProFantasy Community Forum
I also make a lot of use of Symbols in area.
Command of the Week - Symbols in Area (Week 52) — ProFantasy Community Forum
This may also help in setting up your own catalogues for using Symbols in area.
Profantasy's Map-Making Journal » Blog Archive » Random Settlements – Modifying Symbol Properties to Suit the Occasion
And this explains how to use exclusion commands as well for Symbols in area, and Fill with symbols.
Exclusion Commands
Ever needed to fill a polygon with symbols, but exclude the area overlapping with another polygon? CC3+ now includes a couple of exclusion commands that lets you do just this; CONTOURSMX, FORESTX and SYMFILLX. These three commands all behave exactly as their normal counterpart, the only difference is that they will ask you to select entities two times. The first set of entities you select are the ones to be affected by the command, and the second set defines those entities that will be excluded from the command. Below is an example using the Fill with Symbols (FOREST) command. The first image shows three polygons (A forest area with two lakes) before filling anything. The second image shows what happens when using the regular Fill with Symbols on the forest polygon, while the third shows what happens if we use FORESTX instead and define the two lakes as excluded. Except for the fact that you are asked to select entities twice with FORESTX, it behaves the same as the regular Fill with Symbols command. (To change settings for FORESTX, go to Draw -> Fill With Symbols first to load whatever setting you wish to use, but click close instead of Run Now).