Map Editor elevation problems

[L.Tankersley]

I have encountered an odd problem with a map created with my Mapping Mission tool, and want to see if anyone has seen a similar problem with old-fashioned, garden-variety manually-constructed maps.

The map is built in the CMBB mapping editor just fine. In the 2D map editor view everything looks fine. But when I go to the 3D Preview, there is a section of the map that is dramatically "sunken" creating a sharp cliffedge around it. In the editor, the elevation change is from 10 to 11. But in the preview it looks like a change from 3 to 11.

It gets weirder.

I save the map as a CM scenario file. Then I reload it. Now in the editor, the elevation of the "sunken" portion of the map is shown as 3. Ok, that makes a certain kind of sense. So I manually modify the elevations in that area to be the proper value of 10 or thereabouts. I go to the preview, and once again there is a big pit in the map. I paint the whole area with elevation 15, and still it is a pit.

Has anyone else ever seen this situation where elevation changes you make to a portion of a CMBB map don't seem to "take?"

[L.Tankersley]

...from the lack of response, I take it no one else has seen this, then.

[WWB]

Is there water or such there? Only thing I can think of that would screw with heights.

WWB

[L.Tankersley]

Originally posted by wwb_99:

Is there water or such there? Only thing I can think of that would screw with heights.

WWB

Yes, actually, there is. How does this affect height?

The area is mostly water and marsh, with some scattered trees and soft ground mixed in. The water and marsh tiles, and some other tiles, stay at elevation 3 no matter what I do. I can adjust the other tiles down to them, but I can't move the wet tiles up. What's the deal? Is this a known issue?

[tar]

IIRC this is an "improvement" in the map editor introduced with CMBB. The intent is automatically to make water be one of the lowest elevation levels on a map, so you don't have streams and rivers that show elevation differences.

I think this was an unfortunate decision, since it limits the ability to have lakes at different levels, as well as to have a river bed that is on a gentlly sloping bottom. (After all, 2.5m of drop over 800m or more of distance is a pretty small slope.)

I would hope this is something that can easily be undone in future map incarnations. Without a way of overriding the behavior, I think it introduces more frustration than it alleviates. It isn't that hard to go into the map editor and properly set the water's elevation.