Ionizer: I know how you feel, that is why I asked
I've been around Battefield mapping long enough to sense these frustrations.. If you want some advice, at least I can give that to you. The reason Im interested is because FHT made a version of FortCapuzzo which I worked just a little on, and apparently it played very good... something about fortresses works good I guess.. plus the fact our mod contains these statics, I feel it needs to be made at some point.
But, here some advice to you: I think you should try to work more with the Editor. Don't spend too much time imagining how you want this map to be, stop totally visiting this forum, looking at ref pictures etc... I know what it is like to not getting the map "to take off" and what you're doing now is only digging a hole, it gets deeper and deeper and soon you'll be out of energy and inspiration to make the map. This is reality for literary hundreds of mods and thousands of maps!
The reality you need to face is: Editor, grab it by the horns and just work it. You will spend at least 150-200 hours in this program if you want to make this map, I hope you started a 512x2 map, anything else would be impossible at this point.
Also dont spend too much of your focus on ref photos, text, facts etc.. Editor and the BF2 terrain is extremely limited, what looks like a supercool hill/landscape/mountain/pass/ etc on a photo will look uber ugly in editor, so don't mistrust!!
Mapping is a process, and it takes a long time until the result is looking even closely to what you have in your mind/ambition. It is not until you have shaped the terrain, placed alot of statics, textured it, lightmapped it, placed growth etc that it will look even close to your ambition.
OK this is pep-talk more than straight advice
but I know where you are at this point.. Here is the stages all maps/mappers go through:
1) Impulse: The idea to make a certain scenario/battle. This is after reading a book, watching a movie or when the "vision" comes to you, it is the most primitive and loosely reality-attached desire that many many people get, it is important but don't stay too long here. It is only the ignition in the engine.
2) Research: Here is where you dig deeper in to the scenario. You look at ref photos. watch documentary, read Wiki 5 times over, looking at Google Earth, looking at Military maps. Here is where the impossible vision can take over you, where you see the
End Result of the map too early...
This is not where you need to be right now!. Leave this stage quick! or you will be in that hole I spoke of - you will return here many many times.
3) Pre-production stage: Here you hover in the Editor, you fly aimlessly around the map, looking through statics, thinking what type of flags you want, what vehicles.... DANGERZONE - because the vision can still linger on in here, instead of grabbing the bull by the horn, many mappers spend time in this stage thinking out what tank to use, even doing stupid things like trying to reskin tanks or make their own kits, or selecting skybox.. LEAVE FAST. Pre-prod should be done in one day max, a few hours - keep it basic. Like this:
"Im doing a 512x2 map in which I will be using tanks, trucks, jeeps some APCs and AT guns. It will be british vs germans"
-Create the actual map in Editor, dont put any GamePlay Objects (tanks and shit) just fire up Photoshop instead. You now move to Design.
4) Design: Here you go more in to detail from part 3. You use Photoshop, for a 512x2 map you create a 2048x2048 texture file, save it as .TGA (Call it ColorMap.tga) Now you can look at the ref maps and photos again... look at the map
with 2D eyes top down. You can paint a rough layout using all kinds of crazy colors (I use Red for axis stuff, blue for allies, white for neutral.) If you have a Wacom pen talet it is alot of help... Or buy a Wacom Bamboo A6 one, they are cheap... otherwise paint with the mouse...
-Draw up crucial landmarks, rivers, big mountains etc....
-Mark where flagzones might be, just do circles for now.. paint where main roads should lead..
-in your case. paint where Fort Capuzzo is, what surround it etc.
-TYPE. it is very useful, it will be mirrored in the editor later but at least you will remember where stuff is. ("Burned Convoy", "Trench Line", Hills, Pass, Village X, town Y etc etc)
Just fill the map up - design it - as much as possible... you aren't "mapping" yet, you are just like god looking down on the earth deciding where stuff is.......... Trust me::: If you dont do this now, you will face eternal plagues in the editor later - it is very very hard to "design" stuff in the Editor... That is for work, not design... To do, not think.. That is why most mappers quit, they didnt plan or design before starting to spam in the editor.
OK: You have an image now of your map, you look at it, be careful to not have bases or flags too close to the edge of the map, I suggest on a 2048 image (which is 512x2 = 1024 meters x 1024 meters) to have no base closer than 400 pixels from the edge. (Work with layers in PS, save the .psd as you might want to go back later). Save the map as .tga and import it in to Editor with the "Import Colormap" function. (If you want north to be north etc, just flip your colormap.tga vertical first, as Editor will do this also, your typed words will actually look normal in editor
)
5) Mapping: OK: you have editor open and you're looking at the crazy layout you just made in PS. Now work starts, dont get too stressed by the enormous amount of work needed to make it all look like you want (dont think that your vision will "fade" away if you dont make it fast, reality is your vision will change.
No map has ever managed to come out in reality as it did in any design or imagined vision. So focus on one part at the time, for example the actual location of Fort Capuzzo. You have allready placed it historically, you have statics, you will add textures later.. Don't look too much now on ref photos... Just shape the terrain basic, place the main statics where they should go etc.. when it looks ok, move to the next place... fly around shaping terrain and placing main statics on the places you see markings from your PS file. DON'T PUT ANY STATICS FROM THE /COMMON FOLDER NOW. Don't place any vehicles. After you are done with the basic terrain + statics you put the flags you want (mainbases, fort, some more) add one soldierspawn to each flag, do preliminary combat area.
Test the map ingame. Start FH2 in window mode and you dont need to close + restart Editor.-
Always in Editor when you place statics, do Camera > Soldier so you can run with him, see if you can pass/get blocked etc.
Editor crashes mostly doing undergrowth, dont do any of that now, it's for later (Art)
6) Mapping part II: After you have shaped the terrain, built flagzones, placed all main statics (Houses, Walls, Towers, "special statics", Big rock piles etc) Do roads, they are extremely helpful.. actually you can do roads earlier, even in the 5) stage (I forgot) they will help and guid you in editor, and building areas around roads feel very natural (field edges, walls, houses, entrances to villages, treelines etc). Mainbases are rougly built (airfields, tank depos, inf barracks etc) You can now start thinking more about tactics and defenses.. this means shape terrain where you want / dont want players to pass, place landmark defenses (trenches, barbwire systems, bunkers) You gradually move over to the next phase - the most important phase...
7) Gameplay design: Now you have the basic map, what you need to do now is define how it should play. Where do they attack, how do they get there, how can you stop them etc.. this means moving and deleting, adding and changing.. looking at the map from different angles, test ingame.. you can look at ref photos again, you can place the main tanks and vehicles, go ingame, drive around... decide how big capzones should be, adjust statics and terrain so they are good.. this is fun part! Remember to limit the players, a good defensive flagzones have very few entrances for the attacker, more for the defenders. a good "neutral" flagzone have some cover indoors, some cover outdoors, some open/uncovered areas.... Think in "clusters" put cover on only east side, leave west open.. only have capzone inside buildings in north part, leave south part with stationary guns... dont mess them up with too much randomness. I think you know this, as you are experienced Fh player.
? By now you can easily replace the ugly Colormap and give your map some basic ground textures, you will slowly move in to the Art stage (for me the most fun). Here I dont know what you can/like. Personally I use a wacom pen + photoshop, paint around, import in to editor, export to a .png (using BF2 Mod Toolkit) etc.. switch back n forth between PS and Editor.. Do medium Terrain Lightmaps. You will see enormous result... (NOTE:: Many mappers do medium terrainLightmaps all the time, it gives depth and perspective to the map, makes it easier to see distances and hills etc.. especially on hilly/mountain filled maps. This is when you move from a 2D to a 3D look at your map)
Select the 6 detail maps, paint the flagzones textures etc.. By now everything starts to blend into a more "final stage" of the mapping process, as now everything you do is related the other... You paint a new road/path, it affects gameplay, as you shape terrain for this path, move statcis away, or block of its sides with fences, walls etc... Looks also affects gameplay... Basically you move to next stage
9) Level Art: Here you can start using ststics from the /common folder, and small details.. Smoke effects, cable poles, tiny crates, detail statics... you mix this with painting detail textures and fine-tune the terrain (NOTE:: I have a silly principal, but IMO Only the Strentgth1 Size 1 terrain tool (Modify brush) is useful here... BF2 grids in terrain are HUGE 2x2 meter faces, and you need to very fint tune lower and raise the vertexes beween these grids... As you know, the only thing you can do when making terrain in BF2
is moving vertexes up or down that's it... forget all the fancy real-life looking mountains of BF2 vanilla or next-gen games... it is all textures (color + detail). Real terrain is ugly, low res and can only move up and down. These bastards:
10) Finalizing: You move those up or down with size 1 strength 1 to get a perfect terrain wrap around the bottom of the bunker for example.. or make a slight ege of a road or border of a field...
You also place growth now, this is CRASH-CAUSE #1 in Editor so save, save save.... It is easy to do this, no need for me to talk about it + I dont have any tips except "make it look ok".
You adjust the light in the map, this is important, more important than textures... here you will get help as well, dont spend energy/time on it if you dont wanna learn it now, I can help you or any other dev as well
You place Ambient Sounds and Effects
You handplace all soldierspawnpoints
You lace all the spawning kits, vehicles and stationary weapons, you build little places for them.. dont place an At gun just on the ground.. shape the terrain, paint it, place cover, small details etc etc..
Design - Mapping - gameplay - Art. Split these terms up in your own way, look at what youre doing and place your actions in some category.. if you realize you're darting back n forth between them in a circle and nothing happens with the map, you panic and get angry - this is proof you arent doing one of the separate things at the time.... result is: no result, only frustration.
Get rid quickly of the dreams, the ambitions, the visions and the
end-result. Really, I advice you. What you have infront of you is the Sixteenth Chapel and a few buckets of paint. Do one thing at the time, it will take alot of time.. never stress..
-Set keyboard shortcuts for Move / rotate statics (no need for ALT+key, just set any key.. I have PgDown + End)
-Save LevelEditor all the time, it takes a few seconds only. Save Terrain Editor before you switch to level editor.. if Editor crashes in LevelEditor, you loose all the terrainwork you did...
-If you have done Undergrowth + Terrain/textures: Save first Undergrowth, then terrain (deselect everything except undergrowth, save, then save the rest)
-Don't make you Editor load all the content of FH2 (In Mod > Mod manager), deselect "Load Parent Mod"(wont load BF2 stuff which you shouldnt use anyway) and deselect Effects, Kits, Weapons, Vehicles etc it will load in seconds, you can load that stuff later on when you need it. Just load what you need! for example Vegitation, Soldier, StaticObjects. (soldier is needed to be able to walk around in the editor in Camera>Soldier)
Any tools or tips I mentioned in here that you dont have / know.. please ask: all are needed to map. I dont know if this has helped you, as it hasnt been alot of real tips, just a motivational "mindset" you must reach, this is hard stuff.. companies pay professionals to do this, exactly this so dont except it to be a dance on roses, it is hard.. but mostly: it takes time... gigantic portions of time. I hope you have it. Fort Capuzzo on 512x2 will have ~3000 statics, it would take me ~6 months to do it on my spare time.. ~3 if I was free all the time.
You will reach some milestones as well, stages when you can tick my stages off above^ count these! You will feel awesome when you have finished all the basic stuff, when you have a real "map" infront of you, and not just ideas and clutter...
I hope you do it, whatever help you need, just ask. thx if you read all of this