EDIT: Misunderstood last reply.

Hm. Now you have me maybe half-convinced that the only things in color on the cloth map should be faction-related. I'm also starting to wonder just how things might look on a Ludicrous map with 32 major factions and an accompanying horde of late-game vassals. Makes me again want a sort of 'map room' UI where I can easily tweak the display to get the type of info I want most at the moment.

• Terrain Overlay - Colors in the terrain (Ocean, Forests, Mountains, etc)
• Politcal Overlay - Colors in the factions territory with their respective color.
• A road/trade overlay?
• Dungeon/Map Object Overlay - (Fountains, bags, turned over carts)
• Forsaken/Unforsaken ground Overlay
• etc.

Each overlay will turn on the color for the associated objects.  This way you can quickly narrow things down if the map gets too busy with other things turned on.  Place the toggle buttons right under the minimap, and have them hide when it does.  The important thing is that the overlays merely 'color in' things that are already there.  With all the overlays off, the map is just a brown color, and with them all on everything should have some color.

Speaking of ...

Where should I put my "Map_Parchment_Tile_Water.png" ?

Is there some kind of "override" ? I tried tu put my file in the mydocuments\blahblahblah\elemental\Tiles but it doesn't seem to work.

I don't want to rename the true file each time I want to test my file

I understand where you're coming from here. Too many colors, expecially bright ones close together and similar ones in a small area, can make the screen impossible to comprehend. But I think if you choose the correct brightness and hues it could really add an aestetic appeal to the cloth map, which if my comp can even play elemental, will be mostly all I look at. 

For example, make the ocean in the OP's pic a more grey-ish blue and I think the colors would mesh really well and not distract from the rest of the map.

So I guess it's a balancing act like everything else. Make the cloth map look good while keeping clutter down and information easy to see.

This.

Well I have to agree that the coastline seems to sometimes blend in too well.  I am definitely in for proposing as many custom features as stardock personnel are willing to put in there to make the game fit your mental intake.

R,

Nacho

Have you found a way to avoid overwriting the file ? I would prefer an "override" solution, like in NeverWinter Nights 2.

I'll accept that and also add that shoreline is very essential data. I like the idea of having just the ocean waves be blue but there are lots of ways of doing it. Texturing the oceans different? Darker shading?

In my opinion ocean/coastline, life infused ground, wild ground, and death infused grounds are among things you really need to be able to figure out at a glance by looking at.

Oh, and just for the sake of it here is an old illuminated map showing how they colored oceans and different pieces of information on a map.

Tolkien also created a number of watercolor images that I think could be good sources of inspiration. Plus others have tried to copy his style and make full-color maps.

Some of you have said that the clothmap don't need colour because we will be able to zoom and see the world with it's colour when graphics were enabled... but if the plan is to beta test the game with the cloth map, adding a bit of colour is a must, at least for being able to distinguish different kind of lands (as someone else said in this thread, I didn't know there were different kind of land until I read it here).

I love this idea!

I also think the map should resemble the mod Elven Map Redux for Oblivion screenshot below.

That's exactly what i said previously (but i'm lazy and didn't look for the pic :P)

I like the idea of shading the coastlines though, that would give a nice feel to it

After Seeing and Image, I disagree strongly. That map is far too busy, and would detract from the purpose of the cloth map, as stated by BoogieBac. Consider having to get information on enemy/ally strength at a glance, that information is now competing to stand out from the map, instead of the map being subdued to allow that information through quickly.

Thx.  Putting that into place as soon as I get home.

Think about the idea, and not the image itself, because it's obvious that it dosen't fit the art style of the clothmap. But, for example, developers could implement a map in which terrain under fog of war is completely brown, and visible areas have some colour on them, either like in Nezic mockup (preferibly), or with coloured lines as other have suggested.

Aesthetics aside, I hope that the fog of war will not hide any stuctures that are revealed when they come into a unit's view. In GalCiv2, starbases (non-colony, immobile structures) are treated like ships in this regard, so they disappear if you don't keep them in sensor range. If something is big and obviously immobile, it ought to stay on the FoW part of your map until a unit comes by to refresh the data.

I am still somewhat against the the idea of the elven map, to a degree. When you are zoomed out, which is what the cloth map will represent, the only info that should be present is critical info. Any additional coloring will compete for attention, it is the way the mind works which makes this an issue. Further more, I think a page should be taken out of Sin's book, which I would be horribly surprized if SD was not already contemplating what I am about to say, to some degree. As you zoom in, priorities for data, as well as the chance for loss of focus on critical information reduces, mainly because there is less information to absorb at a glance. So at levels of zooming in, other things can be brought into focus like coloring land, etc.

Regardless, basic land formation is, in my opinion, Critical information. A means to distinguish terrains with the most impact (i.e. oceans, mountains, and other terrain that may advance/impede movement) is important.

Has anyone found a way to "mod" the game without deleting original files ? I would like to change the see tile without overwriting the original one ...

...make a copy of original first?

I understand the idea of fast transfer of faction data based on color, but I think having no other color in the cloth map is taking the idea too far.  The first time I came upon ocean I had no idea what it was until I revealed a good chunk of it.  Others have pointed out deathlands, etc and I think its just as important to convey that information quickly as enemy units.  Perhaps drawing the shoreline and borders differently so that they stand out better would do it without the need for color, but aesthetically speaking I like a little color in it.

Put differently, it sounds like most people will want to use a modded map if there isn't more color in it, but if most people are going to want it should we really have to mod it in?  I say include toggles/options for color in the cloth map.  That way, when the map gets busy late in the game (and we have seen the map enough to know the features by memory) we can toggle it off to see the units and cities better.