Trouble changing the Sky Background

[Anti_Bodies]

I am making a lush forest terrain, and its going fine, except 1 problem, the sky is pitch black.

The time of day is the afternoon so its not like its a cloudy night with no stars

I have tried setting the Sky Background in triggers but that doesnt do anything (event, elapsed time is .1 seconds, Action: Environment Set Skybox Background Model to Auir....)

Any tricks/help is appreciated, with +rep of course. This seems like a silly problem. I know in other terrain sets ive made maps on, some automatically have backgrounds, some are like this. Maybe its a beta thing?

 

[Dekar]

I think you need to move the far clipping plane with control + mouse wheel.

 

[Anti_Bodies]

It shows up pitch black in the editor and while playing, cinematic mode or not.

 

[MGCǂSpectre]

I have the same issue but in my case im using a camera that views frm above and I thought like in war3 a 3D or other camera may cause it but in war3 you still had sky. Did it work with control+ mouse scroll?

 

[Anti_Bodies]

I have not tried control + mouse scroll (like with what u do in WC3), because I want to see it in game, IDC about editor. Its just black as if their is no sky file to look at.

 

[JakeCake]

I'm pretty sure this is a bug from blizzard's. I believe there is only terrain-template that comes with an actual working sky-box. I don't remember the name of that tileset though :S You can change your sky-box data in the data-editor under "texture-sets" I believe. I haven't found a solution yet :C

 

[Anti_Bodies]

The control click menuver shows a sky background in the editor, but not in the actual game. And when I go to the texture sets editor and change the background stuff, it doesn't appear to have an effect. +rep anyways

 

[Mille25]

i can confirm that, wasnt able to get a sky working either. i also tried camera far clip 9999 with no success. seems like its really bugged. also fog effects seem quite strange to me and MUCH worse then in wc3, what is really disappointing.

 

[JakeCake]

i can confirm that, wasnt able to get a sky working either. i also tried camera far clip 9999 with no success. seems like its really bugged. also fog effects seem quite strange to me and MUCH worse then in wc3, what is really disappointing.

The fog is really great actually, at least in my opinion. Seemed strange to me as well the first time I used it, but if you keep a few things in mind, it's actually really easy to get an awesome fog effect

Just go to your tileset in the "Terrain Texture Sets" in the data-editor.
- The first value about the fog is the "fog Falloff" which really is the tricky one. you might as well as I, first think that this value is how long range the fog should fade out over, just like most things in the Wc3 world-editor works, but it is actually how much the fog falls off over a range.So a higher value will create a more intensive falloff. 0 will not let the fog falloff at all, that be.
- The second value for fog is "Fog Starting Height", which you should mostly just play around with, but remember, that negative values gives great results as well.
In my map "Heroes of the Void" I use the following values for a heavy fog. My terrain height is a default of 8 I believe:
Fog Falloff: 0.135
Fog Starting Height: 5.0

 

[Hawkwing]

Make a map on Braxis Alpha (Space Platform) and change the tileset. The sky should show, given the sky model for that tileset is functional.

I believe the Aiur skybox is not.

EDIT - IMPORTANT: I forgot to mention that you need to make a camera once you make the new map. If you change the tileset and come back to the map later, I believe the sky disappears. If you make a camera, for whatever reasons it stays.

 

[Anti_Bodies]

Make a map on Braxis Alpha (Space Platform) and change the tileset. The sky should show, given the sky model for that tileset is functional.

I believe the Aiur skybox is not.

Would you think that eventually Blizzard will release an update fixing this problem? Because I have a whole terrain piece ready to show off, but the black background takes away too much of its prettyness.

 

[MGCǂSpectre]

Make a map on Braxis Alpha (Space Platform) and change the tileset. The sky should show, given the sky model for that tileset is functional.

I believe the Aiur skybox is not.

So the reason why the sky never shows (e.g on Belshir) is there is a bug and for now only braxis works?

 

[Hawkwing]

IMPORTANT: I forgot to mention that you need to make a camera once you make the new map. If you change the tileset and come back to the map later, I believe the sky disappears. If you make a camera, for whatever reasons it stays.

Would you think that eventually Blizzard will release an update fixing this problem? Because I have a whole terrain piece ready to show off, but the black background takes away too much of its prettyness.

Yeah. It doesn't seem like something that's that hard to correct. I'm hoping for it to be changed by the retail or Phase 2 of the beta.

So the reason why the sky never shows (e.g on Belshir) is there is a bug and for now only braxis works?

Yeah. The thing was Braxis Alpha is that the sky is there by default so you're sort of cheating your way to getting the sky to show.

 

[MGCǂSpectre]

Yeah. The thing was Braxis Alpha is that the sky is there by default so you're sort of cheating your way to getting the sky to show.

I see, thanks, but can I simply replace the sky to be Braxis Alpha and with Belshir sky without having to turn the whole tileset from belshir to braxis?

 

[Rao Dao Zao]

The property you need is under Terrain Texture Sets. Change the "Camera" property to "Space Platform (Unknown)".

It requires a restart and/or buggery to get it to finally appear in the editor, but that will make the sky show up for real. Never tried any of the other camera values.

 

[MGCǂSpectre]

I'm using a Belshir map and a camera viewing a flying unit frm above the unit. So I made "Camera" property to "Space Platform (Unknown)" for Belshir but ingame/ineditor the sky is still black. So unless the only way to do it is really to have to change the whole terrain.. to braxis

 

[Anti_Bodies]

I'm just gonna drop my forest project till this problem is fixed, or deemed never to be fixed, which in that case I'll figure out something to block out the black.

 

[Pedagree]

Solution

I think i have found the perfect solution for this skybox problem

At first we need a unit that does not attack.

ex: SS_BackgroundSpaceZergLarge

Placing this unit already gives a skybox.
If you don't see it, Ctrl+scroll down until you see it.
To see this skybox ingame you need to set your camera far clip around 20000 with a trigger.

You can change the skybox by changing the model for that unit in the data.

I wish you luck and hope many other people can complete their map now easely

 

[Rispetto]

Also looking through some of the campaign maps, I noticed that in a few the sky is black as well. However.. they use doodads to add a sky to the background. This may sound confusing, and if it didn't take an hour to load the maps, I'd take a screenshot, but it's essentially like a giant wall (in a dome shape) that has a sky texture on it. You of course can modify the size of the doodad to match the size of the map.

Edit: And no, I havn't found the doodad yet, nor is it selectable in the campaign map (lulz)