SC4Terraformer, a tool for regional handterraforming

[tommiej 0]

yes the terrain is perfectly flat. i'll try to raise it 1 m..

thanks for your great tool wouanagaine!!

[Private Caboose 0]

I need some help with the terraformer. Everytime I create a new region in the program, it automatically will divide the region into X by Y small city squares. It always does all small city squares. How do I change it to medium or large city squares and how do I mix it up so that I have some of all sizes? Thanx

[Ax1um 0]

I have a small problem. When I open up SC4 after I save the Region I edited, It's looks like an infrared photo. But after I go so a city individually, that city turns normal in the region view, but it's just that city. All the others are still messed up.

[wouanagaine 86]

it is normal, you have to load/save each city in SC4 to get the SC4 colors

[Private Caboose 0]

Wouanagaine, could you please answer my question? The one about the small city squares.

[wouanagaine 86]

Sorry have not seen it

You need to edit the created config.bmp and reload the city before terraforming

[Private Caboose 0]

thanx, but where would I find this config.bmp?

[wouanagaine 86]

in the folder of the region you created

then read this thread to understand how to configure it to suits your needs

https://www.simtropolis.com/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=146&threadid=76200&enterthread=y

[Private Caboose 0]

Thank you.

[Jersey_17011 0]

hey, i downloaded the SC4 TerraFormer utility v0.9c but when i tried opening the SC4Terraformer.exe nothing happened, as with the SC4Terraformere_debug.exe it quickly opened and then a commend box came up and closed out

can you help me?

[topcliff 1]

I've got a problem. No matter what I do, it won't run. I have to get to the Debug program to get it to open, and then it takes up to ten minutes for any changes to be made. Help? TopCliff

[jplumbley 5]

@topcliff have you downloaded the 2 depndencies in the readme? One is Directx 9.0c and the other is a .dll

To help more info is needed.

[wouanagaine 86]

Show me the content of the SC4Terraformer.exe.log please

[Dekaru 0]

Is this tool able to write other info to the sc4 files besides height information? If it could then it would be really nice to add a way to draw surface river/lakes in it and have it convert them to water tiles and surrounding water/terrain transition tiles when building the region.

Peg lake/stream tiles would do nicely, although they would have to be edited to not have maintenance fees or else large bodies of water would kill small cities, IMHO all other park and landmark effects should be removed as well to make them work just like a river and not a park as well.

PS.: I see you have making this open source on your wish list, how is that coming along?

[jplumbley 5]

@Dekaru  Not enough is known about the Save Game files for SC4.   It is currently not possible to add data to place certain lots in specific tiles.  For this to be possible the entire Svae Game file would have to be known and decrypted.  Noone is currently trying to decode the Save Game files any further, that I know of.  It is just tooo much information.  Especially with so much of the EXE unknown.  We were wanting to do this with trees, but it turned out to be too much unknown information.  And as you see SC4TF now there isnt any tree plopping available.

One day we might get some help in the way of the EXE, but MAXIS still hasnt released the information for teh SC3000 EXE so that day seems to be far away.

As for your question about surface water.  This is not possible at all.  If you want to learn something, this is why.  Water level is deteremined by a specific height in the Save Game file.  This height can be changed, but it is still a single flat plane.  Meaning that water may only be placed one specific elevation determined by the save game file.  With SC4TF you are able to set that elevation by moving water height.

It is possible to remove the park and landmark effects from the PEGs stream and ponds by using iLive's Reader.

[wouanagaine 86]

@Dekaru, Jplumbley answer all your SC4 related questions ( good job ).

For the opensource it is available at sourceforge http://sc4terraformer.sourceforge.net. I released v.09c as opensource

[topcliff 1]

Okay, I got the .dll, but the program says it needs MSVCR71.dll. I got it, installed it, and put it in the right folder. The program won't run, but now the error message doesn't even pop up: just the sound of it. Help . . . again?

[jplumbley 5]

Are you running the debug program topcliff? It is a separate button in the Start->Sc4Terraformer Menu. If you could run the debug and printscreen the outcome and post it for Wou. Or has he has posted to you previously post the SC4Terraformer.exe.log otherwise we dont know what is happening.

[Morpheus47 0]

Ok your probebly are going to call me a ***** but how do you edit the bignes of a city, i mean when you make a new region in the terraformer you only get litle city's

greetings

Morpheus

[jplumbley 5]

@Morpheus47  The easiet way to start making a city from scratch for any method is by starting with the folder.  For this start by:

1.  Open your My Documents/Sim City 4/Regions folder.

2.  Create a new folder and name it whatever you want your region to be named.

3.  Now, copy a config.bmp file from one of your other region folders into the one you just created.

This is where it gets fun!

4.  Open the config.bmp file in any program like MSPaint, Photoshop, etc.

     - You may see upto 3 different colors, each color refers to a certain city tile size.

     - Blue = Large city tile and MUST be in 4x4 pixel configurations.

     - Green = Medium city tile and MUST be in 2x2 pixel configurations.

     - Red = Small city tile and MUST be in 1x1 pixel configurations.

     - The config.bmp can be any size pixel wise.  But I recommend that even for a good computer you dont go more than 48x48 pixels.  This will make terraforming in SC4Terraformer start to slow down.

5.  Open SC4Terraformer.

6.  Select your new region.

7.  Start terraforming away!  Good luck!

[Morpheus47 0]

Thanks m8 This was very helpful

Greetings Morpheus

[wouanagaine 86]

Thx JP for taking care

[Morpheus47 0]

I do have an other question dough.

If I set the colors to the basic color scheme file. It apears in sim city the same as in the terraformer, and i can't find a file that contains other colers scheme's accept for the mars colors.

Is there a way to make the region maded with the terraformer look like an original region

Sorry for my terrible vocabulair but english isent my foreign language.

Greetings

Morpheus

Edit:

I'm Sorry I bothert again; but i browsed trough the previous pages of this topic and i found the solution.

Many thanks dough, its a great tool!!

Greetings

[wouanagaine 86]

Hey Morpheus, I wish there was more people like you that read thru previous pages ! It saves a lot of time

Thank you

[exodus 10]

I've been looking around and I've seen some comments (including the download link in the Modds area "WINXP ONLY") saying that SC4T doesn't work with vista. But I'm running it right now on Vista Home Premium and it's working perfectly. Perhaps someone should change the write up to include Vista.

[wouanagaine 86]

I can

However, having vista myself and not able to run SC4TF on it ( I have not try very hard ), I won't have any suggestions to give when someone will ask for help about the vista compatibility.

So until I figure out myself the way to run it, it will remain XP only

[exodus 10]

Ya I wondered if it was perhaps one of those werid Vista moments where it works for one person and not another. I can't think of any reason that my computer would run it and others wouldn't.

[KeanoManu 42]

Don't know exactly where this topic should be but..

Before did this program work without problem but now when i start i get the message that's in the attachment and the log-file says:

Traceback (most recent call last):

  File "SC4Terraformer.py", line 4, in ?

  File "zipextimporter.pyo", line 78, in load_module

  File "SC4TerraformerApp.pyo", line 3, in ?

  File "zipextimporter.pyo", line 91, in load_module

ImportError: MemoryLoadLibrary failed loading tools3D.pyd

This is both with 0.9 and 1.1 version.

Moving to SC4Terraformer Support thread. NOB

[KeanoManu 42]

I fixed the problem, it was that .dll file i was missing. Strange because i've used the program before on the same computer.

Anyway, is it possible to remove the pictures that's over a city until i open and save without open and save?

I have an island-region with many (maybe 30) small tiles with just water and it would take forever to open-and-save all of them.

[wouanagaine 86]

The pic is not over, it is the pic

If you have only water, move all your plugins out of your plugins folder, run the game and open/save each water cities

if you use a water mod, leave it in your plugins