TF Pro 2.3 - ice world creation?

RogerStenning

Hi.

I've been gone a while, and inbetween times, switched to Linux, having finally had enough of Windows unreliability; so, I'm stuck with xx2 versions for the moment; which brings me to Fractal Terrains Pro 2.3, which works very nicely under WINE in Linux, by the way

The problem: I'm trying to create an ice world via stats from Traveller (Classic Traveller, not Mega Traveller, etc) and the Heaven & Earth system generation package. The problem is that try as I might, I cannot get a world that looks like a hunk of ice, or even covered in snow when using FT 2.3. I'm sure it's a User Error problem, so can anyone give me pointers in generating a planet-sized hunk of very cold rock, please?

The world sheet stats from H&E is here: http://www.coldwarprovost.org.uk/tlg/rampart/H-and-E-sourcefiles/Orbit 2 (5) - Rampart I Gamma See.HTM
The very basic world map generated by H&E is here: http://www.coldwarprovost.org.uk/tlg/rampart/H-and-E-sourcefiles/Orbit 2 (5) - Rampart I Gamma See.GIF

As you can see, the map generated by H&E appears to diverge from the stats (stats = 6-% water, map shows all water/ice?!) so, with all the above in mind, can anyone tell me what am I missing in order to create an FT world that's a rather big solid snowball in space?

Ta muchly,

Roger

jslayton

The big problem with an iceball in FT is that there isn't much to see. One way to get an ice ball is to adjust the planetary temperature model to albedo=0.4, light=1, and greenhouse=1. The highest average temperature with those settings is around -20F. I don't recall how to set those parameter in FT 2.3, though (it's been a while).

Looking at the altitude view will show no change (unsurprising). Rainfall will be pretty much 0 (again unsurprising). Temperature varies from around -100F to -20F. Climate view shows all white with just a little bit of shading on mountain edges.

One way to get a world that would look like an iceball is to use the Image climate shader and a picture of an iceball with standard temperature parameters (I don't recall if FT2.3 supports this shader). Starting with a picture of Enceladus cropped to get the light to dark things, the image climate shader will give a picture like that shown in the attachment. I did set the sea percentage very low. This shader trick won't work with a truly icy world due to the way that it converts temperature and rainfall to colors.

RogerStenning

Posted By: jslaytonThe big problem with an iceball in FT is that there isn't much to see.

Isn't that the truth It's also the view I was looking for, but see below, as you may have sorted that for me

Posted By: jslaytonOne way to get an ice ball is to adjust the planetary temperature model to albedo=0.4, light=1, and greenhouse=1. The highest average temperature with those settings is around -20F. I don't recall how to set those parameter in FT 2.3, though (it's been a while).

There are settings for those, I hadn't used those exact figures, though. Thanks

Posted By: jslaytonLooking at the altitude view will show no change (unsurprising). Rainfall will be pretty much 0 (again unsurprising). Temperature varies from around -100F to -20F. Climate view shows all white with just a little bit of shading on mountain edges.

D'oh. Rainfall. That makes sense - thanks

Posted By: jslaytonOne way to get a world that would look like an iceball is to use the Image climate shader and a picture of an iceball with standard temperature parameters (I don't recall if FT2.3 supports this shader). Starting with a picture of Enceladus cropped to get the light to dark things, the image climate shader will give a picture like that shown in the attachment. I did set the sea percentage very low. This shader trick won't work with a truly icy world due to the way that it converts temperature and rainfall to colors.

(Attachment snipped)

VERY good points, and thanks - I'll report back after work with some results (I'm on lates, so it'll be in the small hours when I get home!)

Cheers,

Roger

Jay_NOLA

The Terraformer download package had an ice world shown in it and some stuff that might help in making on if I remember correctly.

RogerStenning

Um. Didn't spot that; I'll have a look, thanks

Tried again last night to get an iceworld based on the suggested settings above, but no joy, guess I'm still doing something wrong I'll have a look over Terraformer, se if that can help

Cheers,

Roger

RogerStenning

OK, some progress...

The climate images weren't doing the trick, so I tried a plain white climate image, and presto, progress. However, the gaia map is still plastered with a lot of the rainbow, and for that, I'm having to go in and manually change things. I'm well knackered now (difficult shift), so I'll do some more on this tomorrow.

Cheers for the suggestions above, they've been very helpful

Cheers,

Roger

jslayton

There is nothing that you can do to affect the gaia view. Its model for rendering is completely divorced from any of the climate settings in FT.

RogerStenning

Well, not easily, anyhow; You can mess about with the lighting and colour settings; it's easy enough to generate your own, just a little time-consuming, file formats are a pain in the behind. So, so save much mucking around and aggravation, I'm going to use the altitude map, and merely describe what the climate is like.

Sometimes, it's the easy dodges that are most productive in an RPG

The first two images used the image climate of a blank white image, coupled with the pre-loaded ice-002 colour scheme. The first is the flat 'Sphere Map' projection, the second the more familiar Icosahedral Traveller-like projection.

The last two images used the same settings as mentioned above, but I went into 'Map' -> 'Lighting and Colour' -> 'Altitude', and changing the oceanic colours to one value.

I haven't used Terraformer to add clouds yet, that'll be for the finished imagery, and that'll happen over my weekend (Sun-Mon)

Enjoy

RogerStenning

OK, finished imagery; usual order, the first is the flat 'Sphere Map' projection, the second the more familiar Icosahedral Traveller-like projection.

I wasn't happy with the blue, they looked too much like liquid ocean, not frozen wastes, so went with a similar look to the first attempt, with the following World Settings:

Highest Peak: 6000 feet
Lowest Depth: -2000 feet
Circumference: 5000 miles
World Seed: 1815725495
Roughness: .93
Percent sea: 63
Land Size: 1.04
Continental Shelf: -100 feet
Fractal Function: fBm
Axial Tilt: 24.9998674749432
Albedo: 0.4
Light: 1
Greenhouse: 1
Rainfall base value 900 in/yr
Random amount 35

This, combined with the white Image Climate, and alterations to the altitude colour settings mentioned above, resulted in the following...

Comments / Opinions / Critiques, please?

Cheers,

Roger

RogerStenning

Right, the almost-finished object, imported into CC2/CosPro, and tarted up a little here and there, along with the hexmap of same (which needs a bit of work, I went overboard on the mountain and hill hexes in places!)...

Comments, suggestions, critique, please?

Cheers,

Roger

Ralf

Looking really good! I love those icosahedron Traveller maps.

RogerStenning

Ralf -

Thanks

I've got a shedload more worlds to work on for the system I'm mapping, see this link, which will update as I meander - I mean progress - down the path

How are the hopes for a native Linux version of the packages coming along?

Cheers,

Roger