Oh my, I seem to be on a roll now. Several Silverlight game exercise /self study programs have been successfully written. Focus now moves to Photoshop and icon creation.
Gonna create all those tactical map PNG graphics (Every graphic will have 2-4 variations x 2 seasons (summer & winter) = 4-8 variations:
- High Grass
- Light coniferous forest
- Dense coniferous forests
- Light deciduous forest
- Dense deciduous forest
- Dark forest
- Fields
- Hills
- Mountains
- Swamp
- Sand Desert
- Stone Desert
- Ocean "spice / chrome" (the ocean and shoreline will not be images but written programmatically )
- River x 8 directions x 2 seasons (N, NE, E, SE, S, SW, W, NW in summer and winter)
- Small path (like river)
- Dirt road (like river)
- Cobbled road (like river)
- Hamlets (5 variations x 2 seasons) with and without roofing (roofs pop up as friendly unit enters building. (Building provides cover for archers and mages and the like))
- Town house (15 variations x 2 seasons)
- Various temples, keeps, wooden palisade fortresses, Towers, blah blah
- Caves
Am I missing any?
The spawning algorithm will be used to position these graphical elements on the canvas (meaning every tactical map will have been randomly generated, except some quest related maps that GMs can create themselves).
On second thought... Roads and rivers may also be programmatically created.
The Grand Map, used for world travel outside combat, will have to be created entirely in Photoshop. The first editions will be on a sandbox island (I'll use the Dhargenas setting's island of Dholg for that purpose).
