Hi there, today we return with the Planetfall Dev Journals, in a two-part series about the about Planet Map Generation, often referred to as the “Random Map Generation”
Procedural Maps were first introduced in Age of Wonders: Shadow Magic, became more prominent in Age of Wonders III and for Planetfall they have gotten even more important insofar that even Campaign Maps are now procedurally generated.
The tools have gotten so powerful that level designers (and soon modders) have a tremendous amount of control over the planets that are generated, from overall world layout, to starting positions, and unique sector definitions. Further systems allow designers to embed deep story events into the planets. So, it’d be wrong to call our maps “Random Map” as it implies map bereft of human design.
Tech Programmer Lascha is the main architect of the systems described here and he contributed to writing this journal.
Planet Type Selection, note this sphere isn't showing the actual planet map, as it hasn't been generated yet!
Map Generation Principles
First some starting goals for our Planet Generator:
Generation Overview
The generator does a lot of things and is influenced by a lot of things. Without going into details, it does roughly this:
Ocean Sectors as well as large uninhabitable deserts are merged together into larger sectors. These buffer areas break up the patchwork.
Player Placement
Player starting positions (and therefore the number of players) are a big factor of the general balance and pace of the game. In the map generation it is the first type of sector whose positions are determined.
In AoW3 the players positions form a sort of circle pattern (actually an ellipse since the maps are not square). But Planetfall introduces wrapping maps. As you can imagine a circle pattern will not suffice anymore as there is no single ‘center point’ anymore.
Instead of coming up with a fancy new algorithm, we use Player Position Templates. The generator picks a template at random given the number of players on the map. Each template determines the relative positions of players on the map, with various configurable settings, fixed team placement support for multi-player, and preview options.
Player Start template with randomization
The image should be read as follows:
When life gives you sectors, make sector generators. And so, we did! The requirements were mainly having control over sector shapes, sector sizes (landmarks, large oceans) and sector placement (especially distances between important sector types!).
The sector generator in Planetfall has really evolved over time, but this illustration is a good example of how it all started in early development: Add balls into a box (with collision) and when it is full, change them to sectors.
Sector Placement Visualzied
The above Space Port Sector has been defined to always spawn in a sector with city ruins, contain charge and repair station station sites, always be adjacent to the player's starting position and always have a quest associated.
Please return next week for part II, where we’ll look at Planet Setup, Geography Types, Advanced settings and campaign planets.
Procedural Maps were first introduced in Age of Wonders: Shadow Magic, became more prominent in Age of Wonders III and for Planetfall they have gotten even more important insofar that even Campaign Maps are now procedurally generated.
The tools have gotten so powerful that level designers (and soon modders) have a tremendous amount of control over the planets that are generated, from overall world layout, to starting positions, and unique sector definitions. Further systems allow designers to embed deep story events into the planets. So, it’d be wrong to call our maps “Random Map” as it implies map bereft of human design.
Tech Programmer Lascha is the main architect of the systems described here and he contributed to writing this journal.
Planet Type Selection, note this sphere isn't showing the actual planet map, as it hasn't been generated yet!
Map Generation Principles
First some starting goals for our Planet Generator:
- Produce Great Variety in Worlds, that produce great gameflow and feel natural
- Systems driven design tied to Economic and AI mechanics
- Sector Based, with each sector being themed or telling a “story” through its composition and name.
- Modding Friendly, players can customize planet layouts, generation profiles and individual sector designs.
- Integrated with scripting and quest engines.
- Used by the Campaign, so campaign gameplay is compatible and adheres to the same rules as the regular meta game. Adds replayability.
Generation Overview
The generator does a lot of things and is influenced by a lot of things. Without going into details, it does roughly this:
- Start with an empty map.
- Generate positions for players, dwellings, landmarks, etc.
- Generate sectors by using the generated positions.
- Generate continents, pangea, lakes, etc. based on map type.
- Generate sector flavors (empty sectors, valuable sectors, uninhabitable sectors)
- Generate large sectors by combining smaller oceans, deserts, lakes, taking flow into account.
- Generate climes (arctic, arcadian, etc) based on slider settings, clime layout, economics etc.
- Generate overlays (forests, mountains, etc) based on sliders settings.
- Generate rivers and chasms
- Generate structures, hazards, pickups, etc.
- Generate teleporters
- Generate NPC factions
- Generate roads
- Generate beautification props
Ocean Sectors as well as large uninhabitable deserts are merged together into larger sectors. These buffer areas break up the patchwork.
Player Placement
Player starting positions (and therefore the number of players) are a big factor of the general balance and pace of the game. In the map generation it is the first type of sector whose positions are determined.
In AoW3 the players positions form a sort of circle pattern (actually an ellipse since the maps are not square). But Planetfall introduces wrapping maps. As you can imagine a circle pattern will not suffice anymore as there is no single ‘center point’ anymore.
Instead of coming up with a fancy new algorithm, we use Player Position Templates. The generator picks a template at random given the number of players on the map. Each template determines the relative positions of players on the map, with various configurable settings, fixed team placement support for multi-player, and preview options.
Player Start template with randomization
The image should be read as follows:
- Green Dots: Starting positions of each player
- Red Dots: All starting positions can be moved equally across the corresponding line to create variety in starting positions
- Circle: Safety zone to prevent players from starting too close to each-other
When life gives you sectors, make sector generators. And so, we did! The requirements were mainly having control over sector shapes, sector sizes (landmarks, large oceans) and sector placement (especially distances between important sector types!).
The sector generator in Planetfall has really evolved over time, but this illustration is a good example of how it all started in early development: Add balls into a box (with collision) and when it is full, change them to sectors.
Sector Placement Visualzied
- Size of the sector is controlled by changing the size of the ball.
- Shape of the sector is controlled during the conversion phase at the end.
- Placement of the sector is controlled by:
- Making it possible to insert the ball anywhere.
- Making it possible to give each ball a different mass.
- Making it possible to attach a spring to a location and/or other balls.
- Designers build up sector definitions, they very from wilderness sectors, to barren “deserts” acting as buffer areas, to definitions for special naturals to River deltas. These definitions are closely tied to economic system as the distribution of climes and features dictate economic potential. While we were prototyping the economic system, it was super helpful to do this alongside the map generator as changes could be immediately reflected in the generation procedures. This way planet templates and campaign maps could be automatically updated. In AoW3 we had to totally redo some of the campaign maps because of systems changes.
- Designers can associate particular features and secondary structure to landmark sectors. So in the case of a Promethean Vault Sectors, designers can set it to only appear on volcanic, and arid lands. Have chasms and mountainous features and have a set of secondary high powerful Imperial Defensive in the sector fitting a theme. They can add decorative markers, like littering the sectors with impact craters for nice post-apocalyptic touch. Further logic describes the distance such a sector has from other sectors.
Sectors Definitions link to name sets. The size of the list depends on the frequency sectors occur (so lots for wildernesses and fewer for rarer landmarks). Of Campaign or Custom scenarios can have unique names.
Please return next week for part II, where we’ll look at Planet Setup, Geography Types, Advanced settings and campaign planets.
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