text: To do this, locate the config.xml file in the bin/win32_release folder, and replace 0 with 1 on the following lines:
  After this, restart the game and try creating a map with your river texture in. Save the map, play it in the game, and see if any errors appear. If nothing appears, nothing crashes and it all seems fine, then you can be sure that the values you have changed (that are actually editable) are being accepted by the game.
  I have a couple other files you should look into as well. I opened the River.ShaderLib shader file you mentioned and just from an overview I can see that this is an important file. I can see that the DirectX version is set to 9 from here. Whether or not this is a safety measure, i.e. a fallback in case DirextX 11 is not installed, I do not know.
  Have a look in some of the other files and see if you can find a class called WaterShaderPass. This could be significant. My instinct is that this is one of the compiled C++ or C# classes, so it might not be viewable, but I don't know as I haven't looked into it. I can also see from that shader file there's a potentially important DDS file called \textures\particles_and_effects\marsh_foam.colour.dds. Maybe looking at some of the .normalmap files might be useful as well, particularly in relation to opacity.
  This is the foam colour for marsh, but it's equally possible that this could be also loaded into the river texture as well, so it's worth ruling this out. As well as this, you should take a look at the RiverShaderPS.inc, RiverShaderVS.inc and WaterShaderHelpers.inc files. All of these have references to specifically the water depth.
  It's my honest opinion that a lot of this is being mathematically calculated by the shader files, which is probably why changing settings in the XML file is not having much effect. However, it might still be possible to change this through changing the algorithms.
  I don't want to overload you with info and I feel this has been quite a lengthy post so I'll pause here for now and we can continue again once you've had a chance to review all this.
  P.S. It's great that you're trying to add in new values with the XML file, but sadly as these values have to be parsed, adding in totally new values probably isn't going to work. That's really because the ones that are there already are hard-coded somewhere for the game to parse those values, and then use them. What I suspect is happening in relation to the Water depth is that the game is calculating it based on some kind of formula, and therefore, it's not using anything in the XML file, because Firefly didn't create it that way. So adding in new values only modifies the XML file, not the wider game where the XML values are read and used.
  @Lord_Chris, that was really insightful! Thank you very much, as I am still learning all of this stuff!
  I will definitely consider all your time to look into this and your notes on the matter, and I will get back with my results.
  However, I will definitely follow your suggestion about which dx the game is set to run in my case, before making any conclusion!
  Also, I think GTX 1070 is fully capable of running Stronghold 3, but is there a way I can see if the game itself for some reason doesn't run on dx11?
  On their images and developement videos, Firefly were presenting the game with the same river graphics, plus everyone playing this game have the same or worse graphics as well, so probably that's the way the river is supposed to look, I don't know. Maybe that's the dx 11 version, haha.
  After enabling the error dialog and onscreenscript, I noticed that without making any change or modification to the game (after uninstalling and reinstalling and before I reapply the sea water mod (version 1.12.1 by the way, Gold Edition)), and when I open a map with a river in it, the game seems to not be able to find a certain water.dds texture, which exists but maybe the pathing is corrupt. In any case I don't think that fixing this issue will bring the depth property to the shader.
  Also, I can't understand why, but even when I delete the .vShaderBin files (first dx9 to see if the dx11 force-work and then both of them as well), the game (and the editor) doesn't seem to notice and just loads the river shader fine, except when I modify them (maybe they are temporarily backed up somewhere each time the game starts?). Again with the debug enabled, I noticed no difference. Also, like I said any change I make on the .ShaderLib file, nothing seems to happen too, not even when I delete it as well. (I tried changing the "dx9" to "dx11" in the second line, but before the reinstall I made more value changes, specifically on the parameter lines, and still the game doesn't seem to care)
  Maybe deleting certain files that still work on an application might be a common fact in programming and I don't know about it, but until now it doesn't quite make sense to me, especially for a shader.
  Next, you should check the graphics settings in Stronghold 3 itself. You can do this by finding the options.xml file in your My Documents/Stronghold 3/Profiles/ folder. The second row will look something like this:
  Now here I noticed something interesting. The water detail in the game settings was set on "undefined" by default, and I had to change it. I am wondering if this is related to the issue somehow, I don't know. I also played with the settings above a bit, especially with the water_detail (which I tried all sorts of numbers and nothing changed).
  I think I have something here. In the River.ShaderLib file there are such passes for both the river and the waterfall shader (except you mean on other files, apart from ShaderLib). It mentions it's a compiled class, so I am guessing this is the compiled part within the "dx9.vShaderBin" and "dx11.vShaderBin" files? If that's true, then I hope there is a way to make any changes on the source and recompile it and replacing the existing .vShaderBin files. (although the format might be Vision Engine specific)
  About the marsh foam texture, I had noticed that before, there is a path to it mentioned inside the dx .vShaderBin files too, which I changed to the foam texture I made, that you see on a previous post. Apparently it worked, but it's the only change that did (now it's reset back to the marsh texture, as I reinstalled the game).
  Playing with the other textures (normals, colours, etc.) I didn't get the result I am looking for, though I will make a more realistic normal texture at some point, if I fix the current depth issue, like I did with the sea water. 🙂
  That's why I don't feel very confident making more changes on the open source code files, as I haven't seen any change in the game previously, as well as not affecting the games functionality, after I completely delete them. I think you are right, and those files are just the source code of some compiled ones, which might still be helpful, if I find a way to recompile them, after making my changes.
  All in All, I think my best bet is to make the SC2 river shader work in S3. The only issue I think there is in this case, is the pathing for its textures, that's why the river doesn't show at all when I replace the shader in S3 (see image on previous post), but instead it recognises it. I verified that, after checking the error dialog. In SC2 the texture pathing is controled by the graphics settings in a way that there is an archive for each setting with the corresponding textures' quality in it:
  These are both the expected pathing errors I got, when trying to load a map with a river, after replacing the shader with the SC2 one (when I say replacing the shader, I mean both dx .vShaderBin files, as well as the River.ShaderLib one, as these are all about river SC2 has, + I replaced the dx .vShaderBin files of the water shader as well, to make sure, if there is a relation between them):
  Those textures are included on the .pak archives in SC2 assets folder, so I tried copy/pasting them inside the S3 assets folder to see if the pathing works now, but got the same errors and the river was again invisible. Same when I unpacked the textures inside the assets directory. So I am guessing the pathing system is hardcoded in relation to the SC2 graphics settings system specifically.
  So, if there is a way to fix this pathing to work in S3, then all my river problems will go away. 😊 The river shader of SC2 has more potential, as with a little tweaking, I am starting to get a more realistic result in the SC2 editor, although it doesn't have the capabilities of the sea shader, so just replacing that with S3 will do the trick.
  P.S. Sorry if the the images are too many and seem chaotic. The purpose is to help understanding, than confuse, so let me know if I overdo it. 🙂 Also, I am thinking of leaving the river aside for now and focusing more on the terrain scultping, and see all of its potential. I am really striving for a good aesthetic result, like the really well done stripes in Stronghold 1, but in 3D.
  
  Everyone makes mistakes, but you don't want to make them on a scholarship application that costs you winning the money you need for your education. This means paying attention to every little detail to make certain you get it right. You need to know what's being asked of you and you need to comply with the requirements in order to impress the judging committee. Avoid the pitfalls by knowing what's required of you and following the rules to the letter.