Why does Budapest map start with two Town Centers?
The map looks decent and wish to play it, but won’t b/c of this. I wish we could toggle preferences to be “One TC”, “No Nomad”, and “No starting mill” for all maps. Add quick filters so you can easily see maps that start in the standard way? It’s less than ideal that we need to read the fine-print for each map when trying to pick one. And then resign if you accidentally launch a map that has these extra things.
If nothing else, is there a way we can permanently filter out these weird deviation maps so they don’t show up in the SP map list (for Skirmish games)? I just want the classic AoE2 start experience, 100% of the time
Simple reason: in real life, Budapest was formed by merging two cities - Buda and Pest.
If you look at the map icon, you also notice how each player has two squares, indicating a 2 TC start. There’s btw also ES@Metropolis which is a 3 TC map.
Because that’s the main concept of the map. I would guess whoever originally made it had the 2-TC start concept first, and built the map around that. (Also as FloosWorld says, the name comes from Budapest originally being two separate towns.) It’s not the first map like that – Metropolis is a fair bit older, and has a 3-TC start.
I agree that sometimes it would be nice to play on that map without the hassle of the 2-TC start. I think it would be straightforward to alter the script (probably a case of removing one of the create_player_lands commands), so I might have a go at making a 1-TC version at some point.
This was essentially the approach in AoE1, although the only options were a standard start or a nomad start (with only one villager). One of the major innovations of AoE2 was that the generation of starting objects (i.e. units, buildings, resources, etc.) became part of the map script – this was necessary to allow maps with non-standard object generation, e.g. Fortress, Arena, Nomad, Gold Rush, etc.
I’m sure what you’re suggesting would be possible. As an example, Regicide already works like this – if you select Regicide in the lobby, it runs an extra part of the map script to generate the Kings, and usually extra villagers and a castle. This could be implemented the same way, but it would be a big job – it would need to be separately programmed into/calibrated for each map script, and it would affect resource distribution (which is different for nomad maps) as well as unit and building generation. Thus I think it’s very unlikely to be implemented officially unless there’s a lot of demand for it.
I suppose you could try deleting the rms file and see what happens – that might work?
It depends how “special or unique” you think a random map should be. I guess you’d argue it would be too similar to Four Lakes? Budapest has the lakes in different positions and is more heavily forested – they’d be about as similar as Baltic and Mediterranean are to each other.
What is next?
Play Arena without walls?
Play Michi without forest?
Play Marketplace without markets?
Play Nomad with a starting TC and a scout?
Play Fortress without a Castle?
Play Golden Pit without gold in the middle?
Ohhh, sorry, I should have known this I feel dumb now Makes sense!
You gave me a better idea. I made my own copy of the map, revised it for only one TC each, and renamed it. Each player now only gets one TC if I choose this custom map
Correct. I deleted a couple sections and that worked for me. It wasn’t too straightforward, as it’s been a long time since I edited RMS and even that was just some basic stuff. My early attempts at editing the Budapest map kept crashing the game, but I finally got it working.
No need, since I made a custom ‘one TC’ version. I wouldn’t have wanted to delete the RMS anyways. I just wanted to filter it out to see only ‘one TC’ (standard) maps. But it’s okay since I have custom version now. Plus, I was able to eliminate the ability for snow to occur on the map. (I don’t like snow maps)
I liked the water placement, and the biome and tree clusters (oaks, pines, etc) are visually pleasing to me. I ended up playing “Four Lakes” map instead after writing my post, but its biome tendencies and tree clusters pale in comparison to Budapest’s aesthetic, imo. No matter, I have what I need now.
Editing the Budapest RMS inpsired me to spend a few hours tweaking an old RMS I made 10 years ago. In the end, I’ll probably just use my own RMS for 75% of my games… which has nothing to do with the Budapest or Four Lakes maps.
Yeah, that’s what I opted to play after making my post. But in 5 or 10 tests here, that biome and aesthetic isn’t as visually pleasing to me as Budapest’s. And the water placement is different.
A little slippery slope or strawman argument there, but I get what you mean. To your credit for the marketplace one, I misspoke in my OP. I meant to say “No starting Mill” (but accidentally said Market). A map named “Marketplace” with markets in it is okay, although I’ll never play it. I can’t remember what map starts you off with a mill by default, but it definitely isn’t named, “Mill Map”. So it’s a waste of time to launch it and find out there are mills on the map already. I don’t like to be given freebies like that. I enjoy the starting age, starting from scratch, and don’t need shortcuts through it.
That’s why I didn’t like the thought of starting with two TCs. Also, I think some or all Nomad maps start you off with villagers in random places all over the map, which I also don’t like because it is giving you free explorations and more rapid expansion abilities.
As for Nomad maps, I would love to play some of the ones listed as Nomad as non-nomadic, but there’s no option to do that. Wouldn’t that be an easy toggle to add to the lobby?
Come to think of it, every map should be able to be played as either nomad or non-nomad, imo. Didn’t AoE1 or early AoE2 used to have that ability and option before? There are times where I’d want to play Highland as nomadic, for example, but you can’t unless you edit the RMS or whatever yourself.
That was my error I meant to say “Mill” there. I’ve edited the OP
Glad to hear you got it to work! I think the newer official RMS files are written in a much less beginner-friendly (or, in your case, forgetter-friendly) way than the old ones from AoK/The Conquerors.
Thanks! I saw the .RMS2 file type for that map and wondered what was different
I figured it was DE-related, but didn’t know for sure. Someday I will try to find documentation on the DE updates, as I think the doc included with the game is the old Conquerors Expansion version. It looks a lot like what I saw 10 years ago:
..\steamapps\common\AoE2DE\Docs\All\TC Random Map Scripting Guide.doc
Is there an updated version of the doc for DE (.RMS2 additions or differences) in a different directory?
I don’t know about official documentation, but there is some very good unofficial documentation by Zetnus:
Also a Discord channel with some very friendly, helpful members – there’s a link in the foreword of the document.
I’m not sure what the difference between RMS and RMS2 is. DE map scripting has more features than The Conquerors did, but I’m not aware of any that require RMS2.
I don’t think there are any differences, other than that some older versions of the game might not work with rms2. They are essentially just text files, so its dependent on whether the game knows to look for an rms2 extension.
But I found this thread which appears to link to the same document and it’s public:
My own RMS from the HD era has an issue where certain objects don’t spawn on certain map sizes in the DE era. That document linked in the other thread should help me fix that issue, as it has this info:
There’s btw also ES@Metropolis which is a 3 TC map.
I feel dumb now 
Makes sense!
I meant to say “Mill” there. I’ve edited the OP
