Scenario Design
    Scenery Design Tips

by Talon-Thorn

Part 1 | Part 2| Part 3

Part III - Kewl Waterfalls

Next, let's add some waterfalls. I'm going to show you how to make one big waterfall, then I'll add more details to this map and let you see the results. The location I've selected is a kind of plateau I created by placing several cavern tiles in one location. Note the sloping side in front of the plateau that pours into a channel. This is where I will make the waterfall and the river below it.

I begin making the waterfall by clearing the top of the plateau using the "Strong Current" tile (see picture below). I've also added some grass to form a channel for the river. The channel with the raised terrain isn't necessary for this part, but it caught my eye and so it is to become my river.

Next, I remove the "Strong Current" tiles by selecting them and pressing the delete key on the keyboard. I then began adding some mountains around the river and waterfall area.

Note the area to the side with the highlighted hexagon (in yellow). This area will be where the river flows in. Unfortunately, the water does not look right since the elevated water is shaded. To fix this I'll add some trees along the edge to and then put some reeds along the mountains. This will hide the terrain elevation change nicely. You can use a bridge to hide the elevation drop of a small stream, or even use lily pads; however, water tiles can only be placed on elevation "zero" terrain. Thus, for example, I can not put any water tiles in the area just above the big waterfall -- the area that used to be the high plateau.

After hiding the elevation change, the rest is just a matter of taste and tweaking. I added some mist tiles (from the bottom of the "Places" tab) to make the water seem like it is foaming and active. You can also use "Strong Current" or "Heavy Storm" tiles to do this, and anything passing through it may take damage.

As you can see, I didn't do a very good job of planning this part of the map -- my big waterfall flows into a very small stream with another small waterfall. I'll have to do some more work on the stream to make it look right. I'll also want to add more foliage and maybe even change the mountains around a bit, but I'm already well on my way to making this map look sharp.

If you want any cities or other structures near a distorted section of your map, be sure to put them in before adding the distortions. A city placed too close to the distortion will flatten the elevation, possibly ruining your hard work. Be sure to save several copies of your map as you work on it, so that you can try different things and still recover from blunders. Distorted surfaces can be very difficult to remake.

If you run into problems making your tall mountains or waterfalls, or you think this primer needs some extra work to make the process clearer or easier, send me a message to Talon-Thorn. And by all means, send your map art to be exhibited in the Map Maker's Gallery!

(For discussion on this topic, feel free to post in this thread in the Scenario Design Forum.)