How to edit road graphics? Or Cliff tiles?

Same challenges here\issues with trying to mod it.

You are not alone, FWIW>

The next issue for me are cliff tiles.  There doesn't seem to be a list of cliff tiles to be used on the cloth map.

So far it looks like they are autogenerated from the 3D tiles which would umm... suck.  That would mean that there is no way to mark them as impassable terrain, like mountains are visibly marked.

Moving units along the coast can be infuriating because you have to keep trying squares until one "works" and the unit finally starts moving.

Submerged terrain is equally bad. Some of these squares look like solid ground on the cloth map but are technically water.

Elemental\Gfx\Cliffs\cliff_transition_*.png   is not it. That's only for the 3D map, where cliff / submerged tiles can always be told from "real" terrain - because the grid overlay is not displayed for them.

I just want a fully useable cloth map. Then the 3D map can go to hell.

Hmm. In a so-what-it-cannot-get-worse test I removed both "cliffs" folders from the Elemental path.  And I finally got a reaction from the game. (not a crash = )

(actually, only removing / renaming \Elemental\Gfx\HKB\Cliffs   is sufficient)

As you can see, cliffs are now visible at a glance from the cloth map. Not bad for a crash test...

The ones on the right are submerged tiles.

So something in either of these 2 folders does make them tick. It's a start.

And ya know... it just keeps getting better.

You see those 3 tiles that break the pattern? That's a beach. Visible from the cloth map.
That's an entirely new feature! How cool is that?

They changed the roads since I made that mod, I'm having trouble getting it to work right and I'm still not exactly certain how this new modding structure works. That mod's graphic changed a road which I don't think is used anymore.

Frankly, I have no idea how to change the 2D map's road graphic. The best we can do for 3D is to maybe make them a little darker so you can see them better when zoomed out. That should be as easy as changing a texture but where do you put it. That probably wouldn't even help the 2D map after everything though.

Right now the best thing for the 2D map would be if they patched in visible roads to the cloth map. I think they'll have the best luck doing that rather then us modders.

It may still be used, as roads will get upgraded if the merchant completes enough trips successfully.

I don't think so.  There are 3 types of road and I messed with all of them.  I would have hit the right one along with everything else...
But nothing has any effect so they must be using an entirely different mechanism.

In fact, judging from my experiment with cliffs, I'd bet money that the roads that we would have to change are ones like
Elemental\Gfx\HKB\Roads\R1_Cross-NE-SW-SE_00.hkb

So just "making them darker" would not be possible without going the full 3D route...

As for the cliffs:    The animations in   G:\Game\Elemental\Gfx\HKB\Cliffs   seem to be the key to how a 2D (!) cliff tile is displayed on the cloth map.
That's pretty sad because it would mean that I'd need something like 3DS to modify a bloody black line on the cloth map.

As a temporary fix, it's a major improvement to delete / rename    \Elemental\Gfx\HKB\Cliffs   but it's no ideal solution.