Yellowish Altitude lines

[mrbisonm]

First look at the picture below. There are yellowish lines where ever the altitude changes. I have seen that before (some years ago) and found the solution how to get rid of them, but I cannot remember how anymore. Probaly something very simple.....

I must have touched a key by accident or something else, that they appeared suddenly, but now I would like to find out how to delete them.
Help will be appreciated, thanks

mrb/Fred

[joelyboy911]

Isn't it CTRL+SHIFT+C to toggle contour lines?

[Ennedi]

Isn't it CTRL+SHIFT+C to toggle contour lines?

Yes, it is! 

[mrbisonm]

Geeez, thanks guys, that's a real relief, gotta note that down on paper....

Fred

[SC4BOY]

I love those contours, but they are spaced way too far apart imo. They are about 120m vertical spacing as I recall.. something like 25-50m would be more useful I think. Just a note.. they are not a "toggle".. in order to turn them off you have to exit and re-enter the city once you turn them on.

[TheTeaCat]

Just a note.. they are not a "toggle".. in order to turn them off you have to exit and re-enter the city once you turn them on.

No you don't you just have to enter the  cheat code again

[SC4BOY]

You are correct.. I just verified this.. very odd since I was in a city other day and it wouldn't toggle.. must have been half asleep and hitting the wrong keys instead of cntrl-shft-C

[RippleJet]

They are about 120m vertical spacing as I recall..

I think they are closer than that... seems like they would be 64 m apart...

[Ennedi]

I think they are closer than that... seems like they would be 64 m apart...

1. They are about 128 m apart (hard to say precisely, the contour line covers about 4,5 - 5 m of the altitude). For example we have an isocline at 230, 358, 486 etc. m when we check the altitude using the Terrain Query.
2. We don't know any parameter which can manage that distance, particularly there is no property in the Terrain.ini or Terrain Properties exemplar.
3. Isoclines heights and distance between them doesn't depend on various terrain manipulations such as changing the sea level or Max Terrain Height.
3. Of course yes, they are toggleable ie. pressing Ctrl + Shift + C turns them on and off.

Adam

[RippleJet]

1. They are about 128 m apart (hard to say precisely, the contour line covers about 4,5 - 5 m of the altitude). For example we have an isocline at 230, 358, 486 etc. m when we check the altitude using the Terrain Query.

I also used the TerrainQuery and I most certainly got them at half your distance...
...with isoclines roughly at 372, 436, 500, 564, 628, 692 and 756.

Maybe the game sets the distance automatically based on the elevation difference within the city?

[Ennedi]

I also used the TerrainQuery and I most certainly got them at half your distance...
...with isoclines roughly at 372, 436, 500, 564, 628, 692 and 756.
(...)

Here is my city 







But I believe you Tage that you have different distances than me. Some time ago David showed isoclines in 3RR (I don't remember what did he do with them) and he also said that he had 64 m between isoclines. I was curious what was the reason of such difference between David's and my cities, but I was very ill at that time and didn't research it. Anyway this is a fact.

(...)
Maybe the game sets the distance automatically based on the elevation difference within the city?

I don't think it does. I checked two cities a while ago, this one where you made pictures above has a height difference 977 m (between the sea bottom and the highest peak), and another one has only 379 m of the height difference. I have isoclines exactly at the same altitudes in both cities.

It seems we have another thing to research 

Adam

[RippleJet]

It seems we have another thing to research 

It's all depending on the city size!


In a small city the thickness of the isoclines is 1 m and they are spaced 32 m apart:
250, 282, 314, 346, 378, 410, 442, 474, 506, ...

In a medium city the thickness of the isoclines is 2 m and they are spaced 64 m apart:
500, 564, 628, 692, 756, 820, 884, 948, 1012, ...

In a large city the thickness of the isoclines is 4 m and they are spaced 128 m apart:
1000, 1128, 1256, 1384, 1512, 1640, 1768, 1896, 2024, ...


In all above cases the elevation is on the upper side of the isocline.
E.g. in a large city they extend from those elevations and 4 m downwards.

I chose to start the small city at sea level (250 m) and the others at 500 and 1000
in order to show that they are simply just multiplied by 2 and 4.

[Ennedi]

Excellent finding Tage! 

I didn't expect it (last two or three years I'm working only on large city tiles) - but yes, it is quite reasonable. The height difference in a large city can be really much bigger than in small and medium city. 128 m distances would be unuseful in a small city, on the other side too much isoclines in a large city wouldn't be good too.

SC4BOY: I understand that you would like to have more isoclines in a large city, but existing ones give you a general inofmation about the terrain shape, and you can find the best place for your transit network making some interpolation and using Terrain Query extensively, you can even mark specific altitudes on the map 

Adam 

[SC4BOY]

I dissagree.. at 128m they are virtually useless for anything worthwhile. Yes it shows the "lay of the land" but I see little reason to normally play regions with huge differences in altitude since I just don't find it interesting (and normally not very realistic either)

And I can of course find precise information at a given point with the "terrainquery" function, so that part is not an issue. In my opinion 64 is marginal and closer would be of great use. I don't see that, say 10m is very important, but 25 (or 32) or so would be great.. The fact that it "spreads" over the 5m isn't important to me either as I can easily judge the "top".

[mrbisonm]

Maybe just a stupid question, but besides showing the contours of the land what are they useful for? I see no reason why to use them when you're playing. 

Fred

[wouanagaine]

Maybe just a stupid question, but besides showing the contours of the land what are they useful for? I see no reason why to use them when you're playing. 

Fred

One interest is by allowing plopable water to be well aligned- if the coastline of your plopable water matches the contour line. Hence while I'll be interesting in modifying the start and the offset of contour lines.

[mrbisonm]

One interest is by allowing plopable water to be well aligned- if the coastline of your plopable water matches the contour line. Hence while I'll be interesting in modifying the start and the offset of contour lines.

Thanks wouanagaine, but it wasn't Maxis's idea to create polpable water, so must have been something else they used it for or intended to do something with it, right? 

[SC4BOY]

in modifying the start and the offset of contour lines.

Yes, even the capacity to change the offset would be a benefit.. not as useful as changing the spacing, but it seems that unless someone clever finds a method for that, you take what you can get..

[Andreas]

Thanks wouanagaine, but it wasn't Maxis's idea to create polpable water, so must have been something else they used it for or intended to do something with it, right? 

My best guess is that Maxis simply used them to get an idea of the general shape of the terrain, in order to check if the terrain textures look appropriate. If a relatively steep mountain (that would have many lines within a short distance) wouldn't show rock textures, they'd have to tweak their terrain textures further.

[j-dub]

Just got to say, on the back of my SimCity 4 manual, it has a list of all the commands, one of them is in fact cntrl shift c. Its weird how it is not listed under Terrain Tool Hotkeys, despite the command is called Terrain Contour Toggle. Another command I noticed is called refresh, cntrl alt shift f. Any clue as to what the refresh command does?