[BestViking]

I think I already know the answer to this one, but I'll ask anyway: Is it possible to assign a different first wall to the floor and ceiling of a sector so that you can slope them in different directions?
I'm making a waterfall where the river slopes gradually before it. This is inside a cave, so I want to make the opening where the waterfall exits look less square, and therefore I need to have the floor slope downwards and the ceiling sector(s) slope sideways.

Is this possible?

[oasiz]

No.

But you can try faking with sloped sprites if applicable.

[Hendricks266]

Try a TROR bunch with a top sector and a bottom sector.

[BestViking]

I decided to just use child sectors for ornamentation. The reason I initially did not want to do that is because it is such a hassle to create teleporting water when you have lots of child sectors with the SE's that all have to line up perfectly. But it is unavoidable if you want a non/flat, organic ground anyway. I need some nice slopework for the cave roof above anyway.

No shading added yet. I leave that for later. I think maybe the river slopes kind of unnaturally right now so I might tweak and adjust it later. Main thing right now for me is to connect the larger areas and to get the general outline done.

By the way, speaking of water, was transparent water added to Eduke32 eventually? Is it part of TROR or can it be done in other ways also?

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[Aleks]

BestViking, on 16 July 2023 - 10:22 AM, said:

By the way, speaking of water, was transparent water added to Eduke32 eventually? Is it part of TROR or can it be done in other ways also?

It's easiest to do it with TROR, but in the case you don't want to use it, there's a technique of faking it with parallaxed floor/ceiling and lots of sprites to mask the floors, ceilings and water surfaces. But I'd definitely go with TROR now, as it is the most basic use of the technique really and also works on stuff like e.g. monsters, corpses etc. to be properly visible through the water surfaces.

[ck3D]

BestViking, on 16 July 2023 - 10:22 AM, said:

I decided to just use child sectors for ornamentation. The reason I initially did not want to do that is because it is such a hassle to create teleporting water when you have lots of child sectors with the SE's that all have to line up perfectly.

That is (relatively) easy to work around if you pick one of the areas to completely build first; then you can just copy paste the bunch of sectors in order to make the opposite area (will respect the geometry of the child sectors as well as the placement of the SE's) and then you alter cosmetics, sector tags and z heights in the copy to match its purpose. Personally I usually make the above water areas first but either way around is fine, that is interchangeable depending on contextual needs, you'll have to predict some of the features you'll want to be exclusive to the second part you make by drawing the child sectors for them in advance in the first layer already, but otherwise is the easiest way.

[BestViking]

ck3D, on 16 July 2023 - 11:54 AM, said:

That is (relatively) easy to work around if you pick one of the areas to completely build first; then you can just copy paste the bunch of sectors in order to make the opposite area (will respect the geometry of the child sectors as well as the placement of the SE's) and then you alter cosmetics, sector tags and z heights in the copy to match its purpose. Personally I usually make the above water areas first but either way around is fine, that is interchangeable depending on contextual needs, you'll have to predict some of the features you'll want to be exclusive to the second part you make by drawing the child sectors for them in advance in the first layer already, but otherwise is the easiest way.

Yep. Although I made the surface area first, I predicted the sectors for the underwater area, placed the SE's and then just copied the whole thing. However, it seems there is a problem with slopes in underwater sectors. Maybe it has to do with the fact that slopes are kind of "faked" in the Build engine IIRC, and that the SE's always have to be on the lowest point of the sector. I don't know. The floor of my little pond is muddy, and I wanted it to slope gradually downwards towards the middle since it's a natural formation and not a manmade structure. But if the slopes turn out to be too problematic for underwater sectors, then I might just opt for flat floors with some height variation.

Here is a screenshot of the map in 2D-mode as well as a 3D-mode shot of a small part the outside area. The river originates from a pond at the top which also branches into that cave.

EDIT: Obviously, the map is completely empty right now since I am in the process of sketching out the main areas. Gameplay, decorations and adjustments will come later.

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[ck3D]

SE's on underwater slopes need to be placed directly on the ground indeed but that is the only restriction I'm aware of, basically the logic is slope or not water SE7's have to be on the exact height of the floor as to successfully operate but that shouldn't be a problem, you can adjust that in two seconds without even needing to leave 2D mode. Move cursor inside the desired sector that owns the SE, press F7, take note of the floor z height value; press Esc until you leave that menu again, now move cursor over the SE sprite and press F8, manually edit the value for its z height so that it matches the one of the sector you just noted and voilà, perfect set-up and zero headache.

[William Gee]

These are 2 basic tutorials I made for transparent water via TROR.

https://youtu.be/Te7lexPfSRw
https://youtu.be/hKYJbZV0-gI

The good thing is you don't need to worry about SE's.

[BestViking]

Thanks William! That tutorial was straight to the point and easy to follow. I can't believe it is that quick and simple to do!

When dealing with TROR water, is it necessary to have the same sectors in both layers? It seems when I marked the upper layer to duplicate into the lower, it pasted only the outermost sector and not the child sectors. It'll be quick work to just draw them over the gray outlines anyway, but either way it would be good to know for later.

It also begs the question: With TROR available, is there any logical or practical reason to use the old teleporting water other than allowing backwards compatibility with vanilla duke?


When I tested and submerged in the water, it glitched a bit. It also didn't apply the underwater palette either. I would assume it's probably because there are slopes in the cave ceiling, and I'm being transported from smaller sectors into a big one, since only the outline was copied to the lower layer.

I attached a screenshot from what it looks like now in 3D mode. It looks a bit strange with the waterfall just being cut off like that as it touches the water, but I'm not sure if it's possible to do it any other way.
I might just opt for non-transparent water in the end since it's inside a dark cave; that will solve it. I will see when I start shading things.

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[William Gee]

There is no need to use the SE transporters in TROR water, in fact if you do it will create issues, just use no SE'S.

Child sectors are not copied in TROR, I think that is a good thing as you can create different terrain under the water from whats above. Also since there is no need for SE'S then you also don't need to make it the same.

If the water is glitching and not showing the pal that is because....
a ) All underwater sectors still needs lotag 2
b ) Top of water sectors / portal needs to be lotag 1
c) Both top and bottom of the portal need to be blocked, point at it and press b on the top and bottom.

As for that waterfall, 1 option is to use a transparent waterfall sprite over a rock texture...
Or you can keep the TROR water and just make it non transparent.

[BestViking]

Thanks!

I got it to work without glitches now. What you said about needing to have the portals blocked did the trick.

Quote

There is no need to use the SE transporters in TROR water, in fact if you do it will create issues, just use no SE'S.

What I meant to ask is if there is any incentive to use the vanilla duke teleporting water method instead of TROR other than the map being backwards compatible with vanilla duke.
If TROR water works as well as it seems to me, then the old method is basically obsolete.

To the moderators: I would liek to request the title of this thread to be renamed "My WIP canyon map". That way I can ask any subsequent questions in here instead of bloating the forum with new threads.

[William Gee]

BestViking, on 18 July 2023 - 12:19 PM, said:

Thanks!

What I meant to ask is if there is any incentive to use the vanilla duke teleporting water method instead of TROR other than the map being backwards compatible with vanilla duke.
If TROR water works as well as it seems to me, then the old method is basically obsolete.

Ah I see, that will depend on the map and mapper, I used normal teleporter water in WG HOTEL HELL... just seemed better and easier at the time because I had so many layers of TROR already I guess and it was just a small bath of water anyways.

[Forge]

i haven't really done a one-to-one comparison, but maybe there's a difference between how many walls the old se version uses compared to tror methods of submersible underwater sectors.
But sometimes, out of simplicity, performance, and convenience, it's easier to do a quick se version for a swimming pool, bathtub, sewer pool, etc.

[Aleks]

Translucent TROR water might not be the best method of handling it for very large bodies of water (especially with multiple layers) as well due to potential glitches.

[BestViking]

I just noticed the GOG version of Duke doesn't have the "Goodies" directory. I remember it included some great FAQs to look up how to do things. I've forgot a lot of the things that were second nature way back then, and now I simply can't remember things, like how to have a sound play one time when you enter a sector. I remember it involving a sector tag having a certain number plus the number of the sound you want to play. That and lots of other things were described in those FAQs.

Does anyone know if those FAQs are available anywhere? I've searched high and low for them, but can't find them anywhere.

Work continues on my map, but progress is slow since I have to relearn all the things involving SE's and other function sprites, tags and all that. The other stuff is still in my muscle memory, so I've been able to sketch the basic outline rather quickly

EDIT: Here is an attached screenshot with a large overview showing where that river ends up. I've started adding some vegetation in the grassy areas. It's kind of hard to see the depth since I haven't shaded anything yet.
I'm not yet sure exactly how to implement gameplay in a way that makes clever use of the areas so as to avoid the player just blazing through everything. That will be the big challenge. But I have a few ideas cooking

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[gibfrag]

Yes, GOODIES was removed from the Atomic release. It is only included on the “registered version” discs. I have sent you a PM.

[Forge]

BestViking, on 20 July 2023 - 08:37 AM, said:

I just noticed the GOG version of Duke doesn't have the "Goodies" directory. I remember it included some great FAQs to look up how to do things. I've forgot a lot of the things that were second nature way back then, and now I simply can't remember things, like how to have a sound play one time when you enter a sector. I remember it involving a sector tag having a certain number plus the number of the sound you want to play. That and lots of other things were described in those FAQs.

Does anyone know if those FAQs are available anywhere? I've searched high and low for them, but can't find them anywhere.

goodies didn't contain faq's (unless they're inside the 16 bit bsetup.exe file)

Here is a listing of all the files in this directory, and what they are
for. Please be aware that Apogee & 3D Realms cannot help with
inquiries on these products. They are provided "as is".

ARTFORM.TXT -> .ART File Format Documentation
BSETUP.EXE -> Setup program for Build
BUILD.EXE -> Main Build Executable
BUILDHLP.EXE -> Help File for Build
DUKELVLS.TXT -> Credits for Duke Level Design
EDITART.EXE -> Art Editing Program
KEXTRACT.EXE -> This program will let you decompile the .GRP data files
KGROUP.EXE -> This program creates a .GRP data file
LOOKUP.DAT -> Build Data File
NAMES.H -> Build Data File
PALETTE.DAT -> Build Data File
SEHELP.HLP -> Help File for Build
SETUP.DAT -> Build Data File
STHELP.HLP -> Help File for Build
TABLES.DAT -> Build Data File
_SE.MAP -> Sector Effector Demo Map
_ST.MAP -> Sector Tag Demo Map
_ZOO.MAP -> Zoo Map (Has everything in the game in one Level)

I think this is the directory you're looking for
 BUILD.zip (1.57MB)
Number of downloads: 194


you can also reference these pages:
https://wiki.eduke32...yboard_Commands
https://wiki.eduke32...m_Mapping_Guide

[BestViking]

Are there any known bugs when you slope the floor all the way towards the ceiling(water surface) in TROR water?
See attached screenshot of my test map. It seems to work fine, but I'd like to consult here before I go nuts with it in my map.
In the screenshot in my previous post, the central island has a small shoreline that slopes down to the water sector.
Ideally, I want to have the slopes meet in the underwater sector, so it appears like a seamless slope if that makes sense.

My apologies for posting so much. I'm relearning this and I am really grateful for all the help I received so far!

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[Mark]

I wonder how long SEs haven't been needed for TROR water. I never knew about it either because it never came up in a discussion that I've seen. I just tried it and it works without glitch so far in an eduke32 version from 7 months ago.

[William Gee]

The main thing that will cause glitches in TROR is going around corners. Sutch as a L shape for example.

[William Gee]

Mark, on 20 July 2023 - 01:09 PM, said:

I wonder how long SEs haven't been needed for TROR water. I never knew about it either because it never came up in a discussion that I've seen. I just tried it and it woks without glitch so far.

The first time I tried to use transparent TROR water was in WGFANG in 2021 and without SE's I'm guessing its been like that for years before then too.

[Mark]

How did you find out about it? Lucky guess or is it written somewhere? I guess I missed the memo.

[William Gee]

Experimentation, Its logical that no SE's are needed as you have no need to teleport to a different place you literally just fall through the portal.
I think once I learned how to select the texture of the portal and its transparency I wanted to try making water with it and it worked. The only challenge was working out the blocking top and bottom to stop glitches.
I remember Hectic realms used TROR water but not transparent... Its possible I looked there for help.

From memory from my old testing SE's with TROR water create glitches... I think I did tinker with them and ended up removing them as a test.

[Mark]

I've been using the SEs since day one of having the underwater areas in a map. And IIRC a tutorial for TROR water also used them. As long as I made sure to place them correctly I haven't had an issue. But I will stop using them now. One less thing to deal with.

[Forge]

Mark, on 20 July 2023 - 01:09 PM, said:

I wonder how long SEs haven't been needed for TROR water. I never knew about it either because it never came up in a discussion that I've seen. I just tried it and it works without glitch so far in an eduke32 version from 7 months ago.

some time after 22 July 2020, at 09:19
that was the last time somebody edited the tror wiki page where it mentioned that se's were going to be unnecessary (but hadn't been implemented yet)

[BestViking]

Is there a way to see a visual indicator of a portals status as blocked or unblocked? At this point, working with water using many split sectors is difficult, since you have to test - lets say the surface sectors... Then you pass through, but have to unblock the roof portal to get back out.

If no such feature exists, I would like to suggest a feature for a future mapster iteration. To turn on a mode that gives a blocked portal a pinkish tint akin to how blocked walls look like in 2D mode. That would make it much more convenient when working with sectors with many splits, which happens when you have slopes for instance.

[Aleks]

BestViking, on 21 July 2023 - 03:14 PM, said:

Is there a way to see a visual indicator of a portals status as blocked or unblocked? At this point, working with water using many split sectors is difficult, since you have to test - lets say the surface sectors... Then you pass through, but have to unblock the roof portal to get back out.

If no such feature exists, I would like to suggest a feature for a future mapster iteration. To turn on a mode that gives a blocked portal a pinkish tint akin to how blocked walls look like in 2D mode. That would make it much more convenient when working with sectors with many splits, which happens when you have slopes for instance.

I don't think there's one, but a good idea might be to just paste the blocked water texture around all the floors/ceilings with e.g. a different pal (like pal 2) to make sure you've covered all the small sectors, and then do it again without the pal. As for going through the ceilings/floors, you don't have to unblock them, you can turn off clipping in Mapster by pressing 'n in 3D mode (toggles between 3 modes - regular clipping, no-clipping through sprites or blocked walls and completely free no clipping mode where you can burrow under the floors or above solid ceilings.

[William Gee]

Thanks!
Yet another neat trick I learned from Aleks! Referring to noclip in mapster, never used it before.

[BestViking]

Aleks, on 22 July 2023 - 01:14 AM, said:

I don't think there's one, but a good idea might be to just paste the blocked water texture around all the floors/ceilings with e.g. a different pal (like pal 2) to make sure you've covered all the small sectors, and then do it again without the pal. As for going through the ceilings/floors, you don't have to unblock them, you can turn off clipping in Mapster by pressing 'n in 3D mode (toggles between 3 modes - regular clipping, no-clipping through sprites or blocked walls and completely free no clipping mode where you can burrow under the floors or above solid ceilings.

That is just gold! Thanks