The idea of this guide is to cover a lot of areas, fairly briefly, instead of covering one specific area in detail. The guide is also more like 'My advice' than the law, and a lot of it is down to personal preference and experimentation. Experimenting is in my opinion one of the most important parts of map design as you discover a lot of things that work well, SO EXPERIMENT! Also, note that its mainly aimed at begginer designers, but if the more experienced designers get something out of this thats great also! Below is a list of chapters that the completed guide covers:

The desert planet of Tatooine is the home planet of the Skywalker family, the setting for much of the action in the saga's films and one of the most iconic Star Wars planets. The Tatooine section of this guide is broken up into two parts: Rural and Settlements (villages, spaceports etc).

Rural

For the rural parts of tatooine, there are several terrains that can be used: Sand 1 , Sand 2, Red Desert and Sand with Rock. I personally choose to use Sand 2 with small patches of Red Desert for the path areas, since it has a much more 'beaten' feel whilst using Sand 1 with small patches of Sand with Rock for the hilly dunes at the side of the path (use elevation here also). If it is neccessary for the gameplay, you could also add some Tusken raiders around. If you need to create boundries in your scenario, invisible cliffs are a good idea, leaving them visible can be too stark in my opinion. Example screenshot:

Also, so long as you use the right terrains, mixing the terrain is all down to personal preference and experimentation; so please dont take my word as law.

Settlements

Terrain wise, settlements should be similar to rural but with much less elevation. I have also chosen to use 'Road 1' around some of the buildings in the screenshot below to make it look like theres some sort of Road that may have become covered in sand.
For smaller tatooine settlements like villages I would refrain from using larger structures like the 'Tatooine Spaceport' and the 'Tatooine Docking Bay' and stick to smaller ones like the 'Tatooine House A', 'Tatooine House B', 'Tatooine Hovel 1', 'Tatooine Hovel 2' and 'Tatooine Slave Quarters' and also adding some Vaporators around. In the screenshot below I have also experimented with a couple of TL1 Trade federation buildings that have a slightly sandy colouring. Example screenshot:

For larger spaceports or city's I have used some of the larger tatooine buildings and also added some GE buildings and other grey misc buildings. This gives it a more industrial feel and also suggests that the city is under Imperial control (obviously dont add if your scenario's in an empire-free time period). Ive also added a crashed starfighter to make things a bit more interesting, but be sure not to use more than 1 of these in a city because it will look odd. For terrain Ive also added some metal 2+3 under some buildings to complement the grey industrial like GE buildings. Example screenshot:

Coruscant

Coruscant is the in the center of the galaxy and was the capital of the Old Republic, the Galactic Empire, the New Republic, the Yuuzhan Vong Empire and the Galactic Alliance at various times. With it being such an important and interesting planet it seemed like an obvious choice to cover in this guide. Courascant is divided up into lots of districts making it impossible to cover them all in this guide so ive gone for a more simplified approach and split it into 'Lower City' and 'Upper City'.

Lower City

The lower city is where a lot more of the crime and night life is in courascent, so your designing needs to reflect this. I recommend using map copied larger Coruscant or Bespin buildings to form narrow alleyways. Decorate these alleyways with things like boxes (shipyard equipment) and parked speeders and maybe even use debris for litter. Other bits of the lower city are more industrial, so use industrial buildings (things like Asteroid Supply Depot's, Large Energy Collecting Repositarys and Decimator Facilitys). To bring it to life add lots of civilians patroling around, bounty hunter units are generally better for giving it a more 'seedy' setting. Add air traffic if you like, but I wouldnt put much in. For the terrain, just mix metals. Darker ones like metal 3 and road 3 are normally better for a seedy atmosphere but anything goes really. Rock or volcanic rock can go well with debris and wreckage also. Example screenshot:

Upper City

For the upper city there should be a fairly high proportion of cloud terrain seperated from the lighter metal terrains with space walls. The buildings used can be a lot more spaced out also and map copy doesnt need to be used as much to create enclosed alleyways, and the general look should be much cleaner. A nice touch is to have the tips of buildings poking through the cloud. In the screenshot below ive created this by elevating single dots of land and putting metal on them with a small bespin building on top, it looks best if you surround it with snow or ice terrain as the edges are not hard as with cloud tops. To bring the setting to life a lot of air traffic should be used around the cloudy areas, and also a small amount of civilian on the ground. Example screenshot:

Bespin

Bespin's look is a much more sleek smooth one than Coruscant, and so it is important that the design reflects this. Apart from the obvious (Bespin buildings) good buildings to use to create this look are Rebel Alliance buildings. In the screenshot below ive mainly used tech level 4 prefab shelters, however it is a good idea to experiment with other types too. I find that Road 1 and Road 3 (not randomly mixed) terrain complements the smooth and beige/tan look/colouring of the buildings. Use similar civilian units as you would with courascent, however a lot less as it is a less densly populated place. Example screenshot:

Geonosis

Geonosis is an important planet in the Star Wars universe as it was host to the first and largest clone wars battle. The key thing in making Geonosis look good, is to not make it look too bland, like is so often seen in campaigns. Add plenty of elevation, and blend the cliffs into the surroundings with things like rock terrain, brown rocks, red carbon rocks and grey small water rocks. Stalagmites are usefull too, and if you are finding them awkward to place you can always map copy them. Try not to overuse the larger ones also and when you do use them, surround them in smaller ones. I use mainly Red Desert for the terrain and add small patches of Sand 2. Around cliff edges I use Rock1+2 terrain and Sand with Rock. Example screenshot:

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Chapter 2 - Designing Generic Environments

This part of the guide covers environments that are used commonly in scenarios allthough are not a specific planet of the Star Wars universe. There are four 'Generic Environments' featured in this guide; Forests, Jungles and Tundra settings. One general rule for these 3 environments is have your 'path' area on elevation 2 or 3 and raise up the areas to the side, where the trees or rocks might be.

When creating a path through a forest, one of the most important things is making sure the cleared area looks as natural as possible ie, dont just have a flat line of trees, instead make it rough and have a couple of trees bleeding in onto the path. For the terrain in a Redwood forest, ive used a base of Dirt 1 (I chose a Dirt 1 map) with spots of Rock 2 and Dirt 2 mixed in and also a more 'worn down' thin area of path made from Sand with Rock. For gaia objects its a nice touch to add the odd Kashyyyk tree now and then and the odd barren tree (avoid the more twisted like ones). Both types of rocks look good, and also grey small water rocks. Plant - Lush and Plant - Bush are both good to use, but place them under trees or to the side of the path. If it looks like the path needs a bit of colour, the odd Ore or Nova crystal and Fruit bush can sometimes look good, but be carefull not to get ugly white outlines from placing them behind other objects and make sure you dont use too many either. If your trying to create a mixed or Oak forest use basicly the same terrain, except use Sand instead of Sand with Rock as it complements the Oak trees better. Obviously a higher percentage of trees need to be Oak, but some Redwood trees go well with the setting, I have removed Barren trees altogether though. Some of the slightly less brash Plant - Flowers look good too with Oak trees. Below are example screenshots of a Redwood forest path and a Mixed or Oak forest path:

Jungles

For a Jungle path use the same principle of making the tree edge rough as the Forest path. For the terrain of the path, ive again started out with a Dirt 1 base, mixed with Rock 1 and Dirt 2 and with the areas of Sand 2 in the middle strand of the path. For the trees ive just stuck two types; Palm and Pine, allthough using the odd Strange tree looks good also. For gaia objects, I recomend using Giant Tree Roots and Dead Great Tree's (dont place too many though and space them out) and also Giant Tree's but use these very rarely, perhaps even only once in the entire path. Again, both types of Rocks work well and also both types of small water rocks (but a higher percentage of grey). Use the same plants as you would with the Forest paths and same principles apply with Nova/Ore Crystals and Fruit bushes. Bits of cliff work well with Jungle terrain too, but make sure they dont look too straight, and blend them in with map copied Rocks and Trees (or just place the cliff after). Example screenshot:

Snow

In my experience, Snow landscapes are the hardest to create, as there arent as many usefull objects, so a lot of it is down to subtlety and artistic license. The terrain ive used is 75-80% Snow and probably 15% Snow W Dirt around the areas with rocks or trees along with about 10% Snow W Rock. The only advice other advice I can give on terrain is make it look natural, ie, dont have straight edges of terrain, dont make things symetrical etc. If you need to create boundries for your path, on the higher elevated areas at the sides, use cliff for some of it but to make it look more natural make some of the cliff invisible (rotate the cliff and then move screen untill it has dissapeared). Depending on what kind of snow scene your trying to create, there are two types of trees you can use; Barren and Twisted. The more barren snow planets like hoth however wouldnt use any trees at all. Rocks are probably the objects I use most on snow environments, again, the colouring of the rock depends on what kind of look your going for. For a hoth like environment for example, I use just grey rocks, and grey carbon rocks as it adds to the 'bleak', 'frosty' feel of it, but for other environments where I have also used trees, I would use both types of rock and only the brown carbon rocks giving it a more 'earthy' feel. I have tended not to use the Plants, as none of them except for the Frozen and Snow Bush go with Snow terrain. Frozen and Snow Bush can be used however, but vary scarcely as they all look identical or very similar, therefore taking away the natural feel. Below are two screenshots demonstrating different Snow environments that fit the criteria above:

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Closing

Thats all for this Chapter, I hope you found it useful! I will hopefully update this soon with the next chapter.
Also, if you have any 'have you got any tips on designing x?' or similar questions, post them here and il try my best to come up with some advice.

[This message has been edited by Sumo (edited 09-26-2006 @ 05:42 PM).]