By using some neat tricks in the map editor you can create permenant shadows o­n your maps. These shadows can be used to put oil slicks o­n the sea, give the illusion of a cloudy day or just add unusual textures to land. In this tutorial we will show you how to get perma-shadows o­n more terrain types than previously thought possible...

Submitted by Dragonheart Killer and Aubergine. Inspired by Lord Yoshi's original discovery of "Dark Oceans".

Basic Procedure

All perma-shadows are created with a similar basic procedure - you capture tree shadows by chaning the terrain beneath them. As an illustrated example, here's how you create Ocean perma-shadows...

First place trees to create normal shadows:

The paint over with ocean to start creating perma-shadows:

Then erase the trees:

And finally paint over the tree stumps with ocean:

Some perma-shadows require you to do a little more but generally they all start with a procedure such as the o­ne above. We will now review all the types of perma-shadows that we are currently aware of, starting with oceans...

Oceans

Ocean terrain is usually the darkest form of water terrain available - but not any more! Perma-shadows make it much darker.

To make ocean perma-shadows, use this procedure:

1. Place trees o­n flat land to form shadows
2. Paint over the shadows and surrounding land with ocean terrain
3. Erase the trees
4. Paint over the grass (that was under the trees) with ocean

Here's an example of ocean perma-shadows in original Stronghold:

And here's an example from Stronghold Crusader:

DragonheartKiller used this to good effect in the following scene of Greek Triremes aproaching Trojan lands...

Rivers

To put perma-shadows o­n to rivers, use this procedure:

1. Place trees o­n flat land to form shadows
2. Paint over the shadows and surrounding land with ocean terrain
3. Paint over the ocean with river terrain
4. Erase the trees
5. Paint over the grass (that was under the trees) with river terrain

In original Stronghold it looks like this:

And in Stronghold Crusader it looks like this:

Moats

Moats create some of the most striking perma-shadows available. To put perma-shadows o­n to moats, use this procedure:

1. Place trees o­n flat land to form shadows
2. Paint over the shadows and surrounding land with moat
3. Erase the trees
4. Paint over the grass (that was under the trees) with moat

You can even create this effect while playing the game - dig some moat around trees to capture their shadows then use wood cutters to fell the trees.

In original Stronghold it looks like this:

And in Stronghold Crusader it looks like this:

Beach and Sand

To put perma-shadows o­n to beaches and sand, use the following procedure:

1. Place trees o­n flat land to form shadows
2. Paint over the shadows and surrounding land with ocean terrain
3. Paint over the some of the shadowy ocean terrain with land terrain
4. Paint over the land terrain with beach or sand terrain
5. Erase the trees
6. Paint over the grass (that was under the trees) with ocean terrain

As you can tell from the procedure above, this will always leave some ocean terrain alongside your beach or sand terrain. Unfortunately this is needed to retain the shadows - if you painted over the grass that was under the trees with sand then the shadows would dissapear.

Here's what it looks like in original Stronghold:

And here's what it looks like in Stronghold Crusader:

If you are very careful, you can use the smallest brush size to paint over most of the ocean. As long as the tile where the tree o­nce stood is left as ocean, the shadows will remain:

If you prefer you can paint over the ocean terrain with river terrain and in some cases even moat terrain.

Rocks

This procedure o­nly works in Stronghold Crusader:

1. Place trees o­n flat land to create shadows
2. Paint over the shadows and surrounding land with rocks
3. Erase the trees
4. Paint over the grass (that was under the trees) with rocks

Here's what it looks like:

Marsh

This procedure and those based o­n it (later) o­nly works in the original Stronghold:

1. Place trees o­n flat land to create shadows
2. Paint over the shadows and surrounding land with marsh terrain
3. Erase the trees
4. Paint over the grass (that was under the trees) with marsh terrain

Here's what it looks like:

As you can see there are still bits of land terrain where the trees used to be, but at least we have shadows o­n marsh!

These marsh perma-shadows are far more useful than you would expect - they allow us to get perma-shadows o­n to most other land types in origian Stronghold...

Land

Paint over marsh perma-shadows with land terrain to get this:

Dirt

Paint over marsh perma-shadows with dirt terrain to get this:

Pebbles

Paint over marsh perma-shadows with pebbles to get this:

Boulders

Paint over marsh perma-shadows with (quarry) boulders to get this:

Grass

Paint over marsh perma-shadows with grass to get this:

Stones

Paint over marsh perma-shadows with stones to get this:

Stockpiles

If you place stockpiles, and sometimes other things such as walls, o­n to perma-shadows o­n land, dirt, grass or stones the shadows will sometimes remain as can be seen below:

This is a great way to add texture to your stockpiles. Our Customised Stockpiles tutorial contains lots of other neat tricks with stockpiles.

Shadow Size and Shape

Different types of trees cast different shadows so you can alter the shape and size of individual perma-shadows by selecting the appropriate tree.

In original Stronghold, the shadows for various trees look like this:

In Stronghold Crusader, the shadows for various trees look like this:

Shadow Pattern and Density

Depending o­n where you place your trees and how many trees you place, you can get different patterns and densities of shadows.

If you o­nly place a few trees and space them apart you will get something like this:

But if you have a dense forest of trees then you can get something like this:

Shadow Direction

Another thing we need to be aware of is the fact that shadows always go from left to right as shown below:

No matter which way you rotate your map, the shadows will always go from left to right and their shape and size is often affected by this. The picture below shows the same map rotated so that you can see the difference in the shadows:

Cleaning the Mini-Map

Sometimes little black dots appear o­n the mini-map after saving and then loading your map. They are caused by manually placing trees in the map editor. If you want to avoid these, place some trees then speed up the map editor so that a forest grows naturally - the natural trees do not have black dots o­n the mini-map and you can erase the original trees that you placed. o­nce this is done, you can use the natural trees as the basis of your perma-shadows.

Well, we hope that has given you some new design ideas!

Get painting!