Greetings! I discovered this terrific site from Badger, whose top-flight tutorials have tempted me to try my latest map project: A custom battle map for Empire:Total War, of the Battle of White Plains (10/28/1776). With help from the Lordz mapping tools and Badger's instructions, I've gotten as far as creating a good-looking heightmap (from USGS elevation data->Bryce->L3DT and PnP) and an initial jpeg texture map (on which I plan to use Gimp to create realistic autumn scenery). Right now, my biggest challenge is learning Gimp and learning how to work with tiles, layers, masks, and the gimp tools to make all this happen.
Any suggestions are welcome.