Dune 2000 Inspirational Review Video (2020) + Learning How to Map/Mod D2k

[AZ-Stalker]

10 hours ago, Fey said:

but in multiplayer, an AI should be enabled ONLY for side zero. Sides one through seven cannot be used. Any AIs you add to the game through C&Cnet will inherit the AI in slot zero.

I'm confused as to what that means. Don't know how game edits impact the cncnet implementation. Where do I edit this and in what way?

EDIT: With the highliner tileset, I think the main issue is that I didn't know which tiles are the ground level and which are elevated, as the "cliff" faces werent that noticable compared to the bombardment of colors and styles of differing floors. Only after seeing a game in action did I realize that just the black space is non-traversable. My first instinct was that a different color meant it was elevated or so. Keeping connecting floor styles in a similar hue or color would help a bit, while setting elevated ones in another. Or something like that. It would mean a different approach to what there is now, but might help. It depends on how you want to proceed. Example of the style I have in mind, roughly (Starcraft inspired):
https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/starcraft/images/2/29/ScrapStation_SC2_Map2.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20110505120041

Edited March 16, 2020 by AZ-Stalker

[Cm_blast]

15 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

One thing that's messing with me currently is getting AI bots into multiplayer. Wanted to play matches with my brother in skirmish, us against bots, like in any other RTS, but the GruntMods version via cncnet doesnt seem to have that option. Tried putting in some custom vsAI maps, but they just error the game and we're back to square one. Any advice on this matter?

Do you mean a simply 4 player game (2 human vs 2 bots) or anything related to add buildings and units for the Ais to have an early advantage (or any other reason)?.

The first part should work fine with gruntmods; although not sure if you are using "online" mode (joining the lobby) or just the other option that sais "skirmish" (I think). I do not play skirmish nor online too much and usually alone against the Ais; anyway, asuming you simply mean a "skirmish" game, just regular MCV vs MCV... do you both have the same version of the game? v1.06 (there is only two); I assume you both do; but in case for some reason not I think there is a .exe that update with files or something like that so both players will have the same game.

If you didn't try "online" just go there; you can set up your game as "private" with a password so your friend came in; the main menu should have "add AI" with the program letting you to choose which house and color the Ai it's playing but also the difficulty of them. The alliances I think you need later to hit the "A" button in game selecting your friend and in reverse in order to do an alliance (if we are talking on a traditional map).

It should looks like this (the imagen it's not mine and it is older, I don't know if they updated the launcher or something; I only care about campaigns so I don't paid too much attention to that).
https://i.imgur.com/IiRyaxY.jpg
But at the top-right area, "AI players" if my memory recalls well, that's the buttom you need to hit to add any Ai into your game.

Adding your own custom Ais into a skirmish it's tricky; but I think you simply want to play the regular way <-- (maybe you both didn't have that custom map, only you have it, or the launcher didn't added into your friend... I don't know, the online feature it's not my forte).

Anyway; just remember that "A" it's to make alliance, but not sure if you can set Ai's to be ally with you or being ally bewteen them, although in this game the Ai usually like to focus human players first. <-- There are plenty of coop maps, 2 human vs X amount of bots that they have the alliances already done.

Edited March 16, 2020 by Cm_blast

[Fey]

10 minutes ago, AZ-Stalker said:

I'm confused as to what that means. Don't know how game edits impact the cncnet implementation. Where do I edit this and in what way?

Oh, uhh... here.
https://prnt.sc/rhghso

In the editor, hit F10 and make sure you're in the Atreides tab. Then, import an AI. @Cm_blast has a bunch of great AIs you could import and try out. As long as it's a "practice" type of AI, where "EnablePractice" is set to 1, it'll build whatever it's set to build and play with ya.

11 minutes ago, AZ-Stalker said:

EDIT: With the highliner tileset, I think the main issue is that I didn't know which tiles are the ground level and which are elevated, as the "cliff" faces werent that noticable compared to the bombardment of colors and styles of differing floors. Only after seeing a game in action did I realize that just the black space is non-traversable. My first instinct was that a different color meant it was elevated or so. Keeping connecting floor styles in a similar hue or color would help a bit, while setting elevated ones in another. Or something like that. It would mean a different approach to what there is now, but might help. It depends on how you want to proceed. Example of the style I have in mind, roughly (Starcraft inspired):
https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/starcraft/images/2/29/ScrapStation_SC2_Map2.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20110505120041

Oh yeah, I love Starcraft's space platform graphics.

Like I said, I'm not an artist My goal was to implement several different colors of platform, some sort of wall to indicate elevation, and an edge-of-map dropping into the void to indicate... uhh. You know. Voidness. Depth! That's the word. As I developed a style for mapping with the new tileset, the results turned out to be visually dense. Which makes it a bit tricky to map with, but making a new tileset was tricky, so I chalked it up during development to it being different. I do think that, in-game, it's much easier to navigate the terrain.

My tower defense map uses the terrain colors to designate areas for easy navigation, mostly, and is unique among the three Heighliner maps in the campaign it's from in this regard. I played a quick game on hard mode, almost no leaks, uhh... and here's a link:

Spoiler

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHP2GDdsjhk

(This isn't uploaded yet, but it should be in a little while. Until it is, here's a full map image.)
https://i.imgur.com/38pva9C.png

You can see from this gameplay:
 - The orange platform is where the player can place his base structures.
 - The black platform is movable terrain where the player can set defenses.
 - The blue terrain is the path enemy vehicles will take to Summers' ConYard.
 - The white terrain designates infantry-only shortcuts, paths they will take.

The edge of the map drops off into the void, but mostly, the player's forces defend from elevated platforms in the middle of the enemy's paths. Hopefully that sense of elevation is more obvious here.

The gold platform with crates on it is purely decorative. Normally the crates can be harvested, but for the sake of very meticulous balancing on this map (because tower defense games are games of optimization, hard mode should require pre-knowledge, practice and precision to score no leaks on), they cannot be harvested here. Only the infinite nodes, the "Mass Deposits," can have their contents extracted. And then there are the occasional decorative patterns, like blue and white near Mass Deposits, but mostly SBON3 is pretty zoned off...

I'm sure others will come up with their own styles of mapping with this that could give the impression of elevation or scale better. I hope what's been devised already is sufficient as an example of what can be done!

[AZ-Stalker]

Thank you both for all the information and quick replies! This is just what I needed as a pointer. I know AI can be a tricky thing in custom maps to set up, so this is very useful. Was asking in general as to how such things work here and you pointed me in the right directions (with detailed posts at that). I'll see how things go moving forward. Thanks!

30 minutes ago, Fey said:

and here's a link:

  Hide contents

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHP2GDdsjhk
(This isn't uploaded yet, but it should be in a little while. Until it is, here's a full map image.)
https://i.imgur.com/38pva9C.png

 

This is what I was talking about. In these examples it's much easier to intuitively figure out the elevation, pathing, what is what and where it all goes. Even basic art can be used creatively to illustrate a point better, and I'm sure there are many way to use what you already have available.

[Fey]

3 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

Thank you both for all the information and quick replies! This is just what I needed as a pointer. I know AI can be a tricky thing in custom maps to set up, so this is very useful. Was asking in general as to how such things work here and you pointed me in the right directions (with detailed posts at that). I'll see how things go moving forward. Thanks!

No prob, mate! Yeah, the multiplayer maps work QUITE differently from campaign maps, they took a bit of figuring for us too.

3 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

This is what I was talking about. In these examples it's much easier to intuitively figure out the elevation, pathing, what is what and where it all goes. Even basic art can be used creatively to illustrate a point better, and I'm sure there are many way to use what you already have available.

I hope.

By the way, that vid is now uploaded, so, uhh... yeah! If you wanna check out the tower defense map, and take a closer look at the terrain and concept, now ya can.

[Feda]

Hey man, welcome to the community! It's cool to see new people coming here.

 

I wasn't sure where I remember your name from until you mentioned your work on cncnz. Your video is amazing, the explanations are in place, the voice tone is great and the gameplay footage reflects very well what you're explaining. 

 

If you feel like playing some Dune, there's tons of singleplayer campaign content for you to try, but I'm assuming you already know some of that since I saw footage from custom campaigns in the video  If you feel like creating some content for Dune2000 as well, then please let us know, we're always eager to play new campaigns. Our singleplayer community might be quite small, but we're very supportive

[AZ-Stalker]

4 hours ago, FedaYkin said:

I wasn't sure where I remember your name from until you mentioned your work on cncnz. Your video is amazing, the explanations are in place, the voice tone is great and the gameplay footage reflects very well what you're explaining.

Oddly enough I was also staff there for a time and quite active a few years back. My community roots shifted to W3DHub though. Thanks for the welcome and video feedback, I really appreciate it!

4 hours ago, FedaYkin said:

If you feel like creating some content for Dune2000 as well, then please let us know, we're always eager to play new campaigns. Our singleplayer community might be quite small, but we're very supportive

Not sure when exactly, but I might create something for D2k at some point. In which case I'll share it here if it turns out noteworthy! I'm a big fan of singleplayer with cooperative being the second best option. I'm very interested in 2 player coop VS AI campaign type missions these days. Your combined support has been noted and I'm glad to be in good company here!

Edited March 17, 2020 by AZ-Stalker
Text Edits

[Feda]

12 minutes ago, AZ-Stalker said:

Oddly enough I was also staff there for a time and quite active a few years back. My community roots shifted to W3DHub though. Thanks for the welcome and video feedback, I really appreciate it!

Not sure when exactly, but I might create something for D2k at some point. In which case I'll share it here if it turns out noteworthy! I'm a big fan of singleplayer with cooperative being the second best option. I'm very interested in 2 player coop VS AI campaign type missions these days. Your combined support has been noted and I'm glad to be in good company here!

Oh W3D hub, i really miss those APB and reborn nights... Whenever i felt bored of the Renegade never-ending marathon maps on RenCorner I'd switch to APB or reborn. It was amazing. Unfortunately the player base for these two mods seems kinda dead, or at least whenever I checked nobody was playing anymore. 

[Cm_blast]

58 minutes ago, AZ-Stalker said:

Not sure when exactly, but I might create something for D2k at some point. In which case I'll share it here if it turns out noteworthy! I'm a big fan of singleplayer with cooperative being the second best option. I'm very interested in 2 player coop VS AI campaign type missions these days. Your combined support has been noted and I'm glad to be in good company here!

There is a campaign being made with that concept, it has 2 or 3 maps I think; I don't have anybody to play with, but I tried them just using the launcher and playing alone just to test the overall feeling (although it's not the true way, since you are suppose to use the online feature that makes the AI to play on easy).
It's here: https://forum.dune2k.com/topic/27792-wip-honored-matres-desert-mercenaries-co-op-campaign/?tab=comments#comment-395701

It's not part of the index because it's not near to be completed; and I think that today there are some bugs with ais and online matches; not bugs about the AI itself, but now doesn't matter which house you place into your map, once you start it all the enemy Ai will be Atreides buildings and units (or something like that).

You may need to do intense search through all the posts to find the files.

If an any point you start creating your own maps for a campaign and have questions we can help; Fey it's very detailed in terms of terrain map design and long-detailed briefings; and I have done myself more than 100 maps by now; trying to do different ideas per maps and campaigns; for example, you already played the butlerian yihad, but there are 2 more sequels now.

The second it's centered about randomized enemy reinforcements, so they never land in the same spot in different plays; and in the third Butlerian you even face an enemy that doesn't have an active AI, so he doesn't build new units, repair or anything like that (but you can still loose).

Edited March 17, 2020 by Cm_blast

[AZ-Stalker]

9 hours ago, FedaYkin said:

Unfortunately the player base for these two mods seems kinda dead, or at least whenever I checked nobody was playing anymore. 

Full servers usually happen on weekends at European evenings and US afternoons. It comes and goes in seasons, more so when there is an update or release, of which there have been quite a few. There is an insane amount of new content at the moment. I've worked on TS Reborn during my time as active staff there and consider it my online home, made a lot of good friends. They are literally keeping Renegade and its mods alive, as the other communities either slowly fade, aren't interested in new things, or just stick to one game/mod. There has never been a better time to go play APB, TSR, ECW, IA (Interim Apex, formerly known as Imperial Age - we had about 60 players at once every other day because of it before people who were seemingly jealous or confused of its success pulled it off of their (other party) launcher which was more known at the time). So lots of stuff happening there. The Battle For Dune mod is doing nicely too:

Tleilaxu mutant defense: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dLcBcvka-iw

Worm mode: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6077Q78682o

APB Delta trailer, the most badass popular version of anything ever made in Renegade: https://youtu.be/4FLfFoOV0kI

Feel free to add me (anyone) on Discord or find me on Steam if you'd like to play when there is a game going on over the weekend, or just to keep in touch (AZ-Stalker#7129). Or just use this invite link to my server: www.discordapp.com/invite/FwNPAeK

9 hours ago, Cm_blast said:

If an any point you start creating your own maps for a campaign and have questions we can help; Fey it's very detailed in terms of terrain map design and long-detailed briefings; and I have done myself more than 100 maps by now; trying to do different ideas per maps and campaigns; for example, you already played the butlerian yihad, but there are 2 more sequels now.

Thanks for the heads up! Appreciate the information and willingness to help me out! I'll definitely stick around, and if I'm not here you can find me either through my site or on W3D Hub.

Edited March 17, 2020 by AZ-Stalker

[AZ-Stalker]

So the 1.3 Map Editor keeps flashing the screen white when I move the mouse at a normal speed. It doesn't happen when I move it slowly.

Only happens in full screen. Windowed is okay it seems. Is this a known issue?

EDIT: Can't seem to figure out how to place old House structures that are covered in sand as part of the terrain.
EDIT 2: Also can't find the sand blood splatters.

Edited March 19, 2020 by AZ-Stalker
Added Question

[Fey]

1 hour ago, AZ-Stalker said:

So the 1.3 Map Editor keeps flashing the screen white when I move the mouse at a normal speed. It doesn't happen when I move it slowly.

Only happens in full screen. Windowed is okay it seems. Is this a known issue?

EDIT: Can't seem to figure out how to place old House structures that are covered in sand as part of the terrain.
EDIT 2: Also can't find the sand blood splatters.

Heya. There's a new version of the editor! Here:
https://forum.dune2k.com/topic/28587-map-and-mission-editor-v14-release-candidate-full-of-improvements-and-new-features/

Not sure if it fixed the fullscreen image stuttering issue. I've seen it too. Usually I keep a movie or something up on the side while I edit, so I'm typically working in windowed mode. Anyway, there are several different tilesets with image data, and the tileset with those sand-sunken structures would be BLOXBASE, if I remember correctly. The 'tileset options' are in the top bar, here:
https://prnt.sc/ritrkf

Hope that helps.

[AZ-Stalker]

1 hour ago, Fey said:

Hope that helps.

It did, you fixed the stuttering in the new version! But another issue now presents itself because I'm new to the editor; when I change the tileset, many previously placed tiles get overwritten, and it's a lot of work to fix it all up again. Secondarily, how do I use things from multiple tilesets? I'd like to have everything available if possible. I didn't know this is how it worked, otherwise I would have chosen one tile set and started with that. 😕

EDIT: Stutter is back for some reason after changing a tileset. Also forgive the possibly dumb questions, completely new to mapping here.
EDIT 2: How hard would it be to edit the tileset I started with (BLOXBGBS) and add it stuff I need from the others? Could I avoid the map detail override like that?

Edited March 19, 2020 by AZ-Stalker

[Fey]

1 hour ago, AZ-Stalker said:

It did, you fixed the stuttering in the new version! But another issue now presents itself because I'm new to the editor; when I change the tileset, many previously placed tiles get overwritten, and it's a lot of work to fix it all up again. Secondarily, how do I use things from multiple tilesets? I'd like to have everything available if possible. I didn't know this is how it worked, otherwise I would have chosen one tile set and started with that. 😕

EDIT: Stutter is back for some reason after changing a tileset. Also forgive the possibly dumb questions, completely new to mapping here.
EDIT 2: How hard would it be to edit the tileset I started with (BLOXBGBS) and add it stuff I need from the others? Could I avoid the map detail override like that?

No worries, mate. I was new once too, but I had the help of lovely folks like Cm and Feda.

Apologies, I'm not the one fixing up the editor. 😅 That would be @Klofkac. That amazing SoB has been doing some amazing work of late.

Basically, Dune 2000 is played on a 2D image comprised of "tiles" from the "tileset." Dune 2000, until recently, only had Arrakis tilesets which are all MOSTLY the same... except, with slightly different decor. Like, BLOXXMAS has dark bridges, or BLOXBASE has sunken structures. It would be possible to combine some tilesets, but combining ALL of the Arrakis tilesets is simply too much. You only have so much space for tiles, after all. This is what the full tileset image for BLOXBGBS looks like:


You can access the tileset image for the map you're currently working on by selecting "Open tileset" from the terrain tab, rather than by using presets, which are blocks we have configured for easy editing. The raw tileset image is what's being read to generate those presets. I hope I'm explaining this well enough.

Anyway, it wouldn't be too hard as long as you have any drawing skills whatsoever. I mean, my best is "stick figures" and yet I manage. It's a whole lot of copy paste, sometimes some alignment, sometimes some touch-up work, but usually you don't need to draw something entirely new. I use Gimp to edit my tileset images.

All of those pure black tiles could be replaced. Some tiles are preset, like, you NEED to have sand / rock tiles in certain areas of the tileset because the game will generate those tiles beneath, say, where a Harvester just mined Spice, or when a structure that changes the terrain is sold. The unused tiles can be replaced, and there are a lot of those. Those 3x3 rock / concrete tiles that are all hecked up are not used anywhere, for instance, not unless you place them in-game.

By the way, once you save a map in the missions folder, you can access your custom missions through the Mission Launcher application. When you hit F10, the settings window will come up. Enable the option to use a .ini for additional settings, and then you can set what faction you'll play as on that map. Here:
https://prnt.sc/riwudb

I know you already played some custom missions, but I hope this helps you get set up with testing your own. Soon, I'm sure you'll be wanting to check out those neat AI functions, so please do let us know when you've got a nice base laid out for your AI! Besides the data in the AI manual, which Cm and I wrote up, there's always something more to be said in conversation. And I like keeping up to date on new developments! It's fun!

Edit: By the way, did you get the chance to check out that tower defense vid? Ya know, this one here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHP2GDdsjhk

I'm just wondering what ya thought.

Edited March 19, 2020 by Fey

[Cm_blast]

7 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

So the 1.3 Map Editor keeps flashing the screen white when I move the mouse at a normal speed. It doesn't happen when I move it slowly.

This happened to me when I had Windwos 7, doesn't happen now on windows 10 or XP back in the day.

4 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

It did, you fixed the stuttering in the new version! But another issue now presents itself because I'm new to the editor; when I change the tileset, many previously placed tiles get overwritten

One recomendation; when you are about to do a map either left details to the end, or carefully think which tileset you are about to use, because you can only use 1 tileset, it's not possible to combine 2, so if start adding details and later you change your mind and change tileset, all those details are going to change into a mess.

4 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

EDIT 2: How hard would it be to edit the tileset I started with (BLOXBGBS) and add it stuff I need from the others? Could I avoid the map detail override like that?

I guess you mean opening BLOXBGBS and adding for example the Ice mountains from BLOXICE, plus adding a frigate/carryall crashed from BLOXBAT and this/that from BLOXBASE and etc.

The hardest part would come to set the attributes right: you need to tell the game (new version of the editor has the tool to do that implemented) if that square it's transitable, if the tile will slowdown light vehicles, heavy vehicles or both, if the sandworm can move or not, if you can place concrete/buildings on top of that or not...

Like Fey said, all the tilesets share a good amount of tiles that are the same for all of them. If you open the editor, pick "Rock cliff" and then press the "space" on your keyboard, you will see some groups of tiles, those are common to all the tileset, but this is also true for "sand cliff" "Rock border" and "dunes border". So unless you want to remove one of the main tiles of the games, the only room to add/change are the ones that appear on the "X specials", which you can see that are not that much.

So, yeah, you can combine details from different tilesets, but not much room to add those and you will need to work on 2 extra files that require works and testing. So like I said and you already realize, it's better to think ahead on what kind of tileset you are going to use before mapping; another option could be doing the barebones on a map (rock for the player, enemies and so on) just using any tileset and later change the tileset to the one you plan to do. Like for example if you really need bridges, then go straigh to BLOXXMAS, no other way to do them with the others; maybe you won't have a crashed frigate or the buildings buried into the sand, but you cannot have both.

4 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

How hard would it be to edit the tileset I started with (BLOXBGBS) and add it stuff I need from the others?

I have done more than 100 maps, but I am still new on adding new tilesets to use. Previous version of the tileset attributes only had 7 attributes, but with the current Klofkack version there are... I don't even know, 30-50 attributes you can use, although only 7 are "the core" and it can be done withouth touching the others, I didn't ever tried myself so I don't know how hard can be to learn about all.

Oh, and something to complete a bit; the spice you see on the tileset it's just for the game to use, but don't place spice from the tileset yourself, it's not even transitable, so if you add that it wouldn't behave as regular spice. If you use the "paint mode - thin spice" the editor and the game will later use whatever it's on the graphics of the tileset, so they are needed there, you cannot remplace them (unless you want to change spice for C&C tiberiun or RA Ore/gemns); it's the same for the concretes you see on the tileset.

You may want to add those concretes thinking "I'll add these concretes so the player can build on top of them" but no, like the spice, those graphics are there for the game to load later when playing, but if you use them manually you cannot build anything on top of them.

7 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

EDIT: Can't seem to figure out how to place old House structures that are covered in sand as part of the terrain.

I mentioned something early, but on the bottom-right you will see "Rock cliff", "sand specials" and so on; click on one and hit "space" There you will have the whole list of the tiles used for the current tileset, so if you are looking for a tileset that have 1 specific tile: So for example, if you want your briefing to talk about how your frigate crashed so you need the frigate into the land, to find more easily which tileset you have it just search on "sand specials", "space" to deploy all the sand details and you can later use the shortcut "control + t" to switch bewteen all the tiles available.

In this case both BLOXBAT and BLOXWAST have tha frigate into the sand, so here you can looks what other tiles any of these two so you can decide which one has the kind of details you want your map to be. Also, with the middle button of your mouse it will show which keys on the keyboard are assigned; believe me, using them for the main parts of the game (rifts, borders) it's much more easy that trying to do it manually; it takes some time to learn, but they made sense, so "1" it's the top left corner and "Z" it's the bottom corner, that helps (for special details I manually use them, since are much less uncommon).

Also, if you want to try to do a campaign style of map; although it's up to you, I recommend to start doing the barebones, just like adding in which area the player it's going to build, the Ai's bases and only main paths (like rifts to avoid the player/Ai to go in a straigh line against other), and going into the scripting (Events a condition windown - F11 shortcut) and try to set whatever you want to happen into the game.

The reason I say this it's because the scripting it's a necesary part and can be a bit hard to understand; the more straigh events like adding a reinforcements to trigger after 5 minutes or making the game to show a "mission accomplished" when no Harkonnen are present it's easy, but others may be harder (or not) depending on how you understand how it works (I struggle for months to fully understand about the "flags" way of working, while Fey used them flawlessly since his first map). <-- the biggest recomendation here it's to open the vanilla maps and look at what they have done; except for a few maps, their events are very simple; most of us learned that way.

You can also use other custom maps to learn, but unless you really understand easily how all works It is better to start with vanilla, you may look at one of mine, asking why and I will tell you "I don't ever remember why I did it, but I know if that's not there something doesn't happen right" xD. But it's true that sometimes I overcomplicate things.

Sorry for the really big post text. Like Fey mentioned, the manual can give you a bit of help: "what leave means", "I add reinforcements but the AI doesn't attack" or similar questions are answered there as clearly as we could write, but I hope that helps to understand at least the main scripting part. 
Maps done back in time had very few events and they are still full playable, so don't get scare on this part, even if you only do a few basic scripts you still can make a map that it is playable. most of the maps done on the d2k+ site (that I didn't make) are simple in scripting, and some of them were innovative fun and special/unique.

But knowning that you learn how to do script on the Tiberiun sun scripting this may be easy; It took me months to start doing really complicated things while Fey first's campaign were already much more complex that my first 5-6 campaigns so, once again, scripting it's going to be easy or hard more depending on the person itself.

Edited March 19, 2020 by Cm_blast

[Fey]

Oh yeah, I totally forgot to mention that!

If you place Spice from the tileset itself, it adds the TILES that look like Spice, but can't actually be mined. This is why the crates on that mission in the vid cannot be harvested, for example. Gotta place the OBJECT on the sand that is Spice, and the game will use those tiles to represent the objects.

Weird how that works, but hey! We can do some neat stuff with it, so no harm done.

[AZ-Stalker]

5 hours ago, Fey said:

By the way, did you get the chance to check out that tower defense vid?

Yup! Left you a like on the video. Brings back some old memories seeing it in action. I like the flow of the map, as the design is very clear. Later it gets crazy with all the units. Pavement turret positions are a nice touch too! Very inspiring!

 

Thanks for all the info everyone, I read it all in detail. Now, so I don't go and quote 20 things and so on, allow me to just list some questions and we'll tackle them as we go. I understood most of what you taught me just now in your posts, so moving onward:

1. How do I open a specific tileset as a full sized image to over-paint in an image editor like Photoshop? So far I either can't open the files, or can't get it to be an image.

2. Can I copy tile attribute blocks from one tileset and paste them over another position in another tileset in the attributes editor? When I click anything, the blocks just turn black. How do I select an attribute block / tile image to see what attributes it has without changing something by accident? Confusing.

3. How do I set up the Spice to work properly? So, I paint the spice tiles in, and then I have to over-paint it with spice objects (which I can't find)? Do I have to remove the TILES after I place the OBJECTS over them, or is it advisable to just put the objects in and not touch the tiles?

4. The map wants me to place down 8 player spawn points for skirmish/multiplayer. Where do I set it lower?

5. Advanced settings such as triggers won't open as there "is no mission file assigned to the map" or something like that. Fix?

6. How do I place a crate that won't disappear and chose what kind of result it gives to the player?

7. Is there a "everything you need to know" guide of some sort for the later tools and editor? Watching Feda's YouTube tutorials videos. but some stuff seems outdated.

 

The Baron came over to check out my mapping skills and wasn't very satisfied with my progress:

Spoiler

https://i.imgur.com/6HB6KBa.png
How can I post an image? Which text script language do I need to make tags in?

 

Edited March 19, 2020 by AZ-Stalker

[Cm_blast]

2 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

1. How do I open a specific tileset as a full sized image to over-paint in an image editor like Photoshop? So far I either can't open the files, or can't get it to be an image.

You need t o open a png or a bmp, there is a tool that you can open BLOXXXXX.r16 and export to png:
take these, the previous version of the editor used to have the .BMP for all the tileset; you can use these: BLOX_XXXX.rar.

You will need the tileset-editor (on the index has that name), which you can also can use to open those .r16 files, and use the "export" to do a .png, incase the .bmp doesn't work well (I did my custom one using the png at the end).

Take in consideration that you need to use the save as button and pick a specific option in photoshop, there is something about "24 bits" if I remember, if not your imagen won't load on that program I think: There you pick "load tilese" (you can open one vanilla), then "import imagen" with the one you altered and "save tileset" which you need to give a different name.

Later for the editor you also have to do a few things just to get your editor to reconice the new graphic and all.

2 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

2. Can I copy tile attribute blocks from one tileset and paste them over another position in another tileset in the attributes editor? When I click anything, the blocks just turn black. How do I select an attribute block / tile image to see what attributes it has without changing something by accident? Confusing.

Since I didn't use the new version I can't exactly tell how to do it, but if you are given the option to "load" or "import" you can use one of the preexisted, I think, and later saving it as a different name. Just read carefully because I think there are buttons to "add attribute" that simply by clicking add things, others are "select"or something; I think right click tells you the attributes withouth altering: the author would give you better advice, since I used the previous version which was not part of the editor itself and don't know if changed that much.

2 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

3. How do I set up the Spice to work properly? So, I paint the spice tiles in, and then I have to over-paint it with spice objects (which I can't find)? Do I have to remove the TILES after I place the OBJECTS over them, or is it advisable to just put the objects in and not touch the tiles?

This is for a custom tileset? didn't understand this quetion. if it is only for doing your own map you don't need to do nothing, simply draw and paint with the "thin" or "thic" spice. The tile either it is sand or objetc, if you place spice on top of a objet the editor won'tallow you, and in reverse the spice it's deleted, so that's fine; just a few shorcuts, for example, if you draw the around area of a big 7x7 spice field, later you can double click in the middle of that square and the editor will paint all together, easily and fast.

2 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

4. The map wants me to place down 8 player spawn points for skirmish/multiplayer. Where do I set it lower?

if your map it's inteded for skirmish online gaming, you need to place exactly 8, because later in the skirmish lobby people may want to add up to 8 players. If you are intended for campaign, don't place any; has no purpose for a campaing style map, thus are not needed.

2 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

5. Advanced settings such as triggers won't open as there "is no mission file assigned to the map" or something like that. Fix?

In one of the top menus, the one called "mission" appears a "assign .mis file" or "unassign .mis file"; same as above, for a campaign map you need a .mis file (it's the scripting part, AI getting reinfocements, you win if you do X...) but for skirmish map you don't need it (no reinforcements, whatever player loose all the units/buildings loose...), although it still can be use a ".mis" for online games and doing coop maps or whatever.

2 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

6. How do I place a crate that won't disappear and chose what kind of result it gives to the player?

forget about this; we wanted having the option to place crates at will to gives extra money as in Red alert games but alas; forget that; for a campaign style map even if you turn on the option crates won't appear.

2 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

7. Is there a "everything you need to know" guide of some sort for the later tools and editor? Watching Feda's YouTube tutorials videos. but some stuff seems outdated.

People have been talking about that, but the only way to know it's using akafeda tutorials, there are some based on the mission editor v1.2, which it's very similar, but he don't cover other tools, and about learning other tools, in the post of that said tool the author maybe wrote something, but overall I don't remember a big "all you need to know"; there is lot's of stuff to cover, and most the time while using other tools we are just "guessing"; for example, I learn myself were the crates (the ones that appear when you shoot the floor with a unit) graphics are, thus I could replace with the dune 2 counter part, or even removing for a blank .png (no imagen) so they don't appear, but even then I had to figure out most of my own.

Just a warning about graphic things, remember the game use lets bits that usual, so for example, if you check my warcraft 2 tileset, my png and how it looks ingame it's soooo different; nothing I can do about; In fact, the original tileset had 2 colors for the water, but in game it only uses 1 because the game use a much more reduced palette; I tell you in case you want to try to do something crazy with a new custom tileset yourself, it may look bad in game.

Ps: about adding images, you can attach files into the forum, although I think you are new you need the "permission", send a pm to gobalopper (STAFF at the top) so you are a approved or confirmed used or whatever it is called.

Edited March 19, 2020 by Cm_blast

[Fey]

7 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

Yup! Left you a like on the video. Brings back some old memories seeing it in action. I like the flow of the map, as the design is very clear. Later it gets crazy with all the units. Pavement turret positions are a nice touch too! Very inspiring!

Ah, thank you! Glad you enjoyed it.

I believe a tower defense map that works is a game of optimization. Although the map is beatable on your first try with a few leaks, hard mode requires precision, and no leaks hard mode requires both precision and practice. This is the only map of its kind in the campaign; other maps are much less formatted, less linear.

7 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

1. How do I open a specific tileset as a full sized image to over-paint in an image editor like Photoshop? So far I either can't open the files, or can't get it to be an image.

The "Tile Set Editor" can open the map image files and export them. You can find a link to that, and other important tools, in this thread:
https://forum.dune2k.com/topic/27756-all-completed-mods-and-tools-index-dune-2000/

Once you have it exported, you should be able to open the image elsewhere - for editing.

7 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

2. Can I copy tile attribute blocks from one tileset and paste them over another position in another tileset in the attributes editor? When I click anything, the blocks just turn black. How do I select an attribute block / tile image to see what attributes it has without changing something by accident? Confusing.

Ah, when you're clicking on them and they turn black, that means you're setting them to have ZERO attributes. I was confused by this too. Here's a screenshot from the tileset editor, which is independent of the new 1.4 editor:
https://prnt.sc/rjbdgw

You can surely find this tool in the index thread.

Here I have the Giedi Prime tileset open. I have opened both a .bmp image (24 bit type, IIRC, which Windows Paint can save a file as) and the tile attributes .bin file. I have selected a number of game attributes on the sidebar and selected "Mark tiles of this type." As you can see, only the Base Platform tiles make use of these attributes. If I select different game attributes, other tiles will be highlighted. It's not possible to copy-paste attributes, I think, but you can see which tiles have what attributes and easily configure them.

Unless Klof has figured out a way to make attributes apply only to a single map, the attributes file for a tileset will apply to EVERY map made with that tileset. Thus, the creation of a new tileset is fairly rare since if it were done for every new map, it would be kind of a hassle.

By the way, the tile attributes .bin file name cannot be very long. "TILEFEY1" works, for instance, but trying five characters on the end resulted in things being broken in-game. It doesn't need to be "TILEATR," it could probably be "TILESCO1 / 2 / 3" etc.

7 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

3. How do I set up the Spice to work properly? So, I paint the spice tiles in, and then I have to over-paint it with spice objects (which I can't find)? Do I have to remove the TILES after I place the OBJECTS over them, or is it advisable to just put the objects in and not touch the tiles?

Paint sand tiles first. Then, under the same tab, Terrain, there's an option to paint thin Spice. Simply click and drag your mouse wherever you want the Spice to appear. It can then be harvested in-game, and the sand tiles beneath will be regenerated. Here's another screenshot:
https://prnt.sc/rjbho6

DON'T go to the tileset image file and paint the Spice as part of the tileset. This Spice here will not be harvestable in-game, even though if you mouse over it, it will read, "Spice."
https://prnt.sc/rjbiu5

7 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

4. The map wants me to place down 8 player spawn points for skirmish/multiplayer. Where do I set it lower?

Unfortunately, as Cm said, you DO need to place all eight spawn points. However, you can set it so some of them don't spawn anything. There are Multiplayer-only behaviors that can be put in the .ini for the map. Here's an example...

Spoiler

[Multiplayer]
Worms=no
UnitCount=0
StartWithMCV=no
UseDefaultWinLoseEvents=yes

An .ini file will be saved along with the .map and .mis files if you enable it. In that .ini file is a bunch of extra options, like custom text, single-player settings, etc. The .ini file is where you put those lines of text, which basically prevent any units from spawning at the player spawners so that player 1 gets all side 0 units you place on the map, the second player in the lobby gets all side 1 units, and so on.

7 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

5. Advanced settings such as triggers won't open as there "is no mission file assigned to the map" or something like that. Fix?

Although a .mis file isn't really necessary for a multi-player map usually, you might want one for some reason or another. @Klofkac, if "no .mis file is found for this map," do you suppose you could have the editor ask if you want to create one? Anyway, if you want to assign one to the map, that's easy. Just copy an existing one and give it the right name. For instance, if the map is called "test.map" then the .mis file needs to be named "_test.mis" and there you have it. X out of the editor, start it up, load your map, then hit F10 or F11 and see what pops up.

7 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

6. How do I place a crate that won't disappear and chose what kind of result it gives to the player?

I think we've been trying to figure this one out for a while. There doesn't seem to be a special value for crates, at least not one that we've discovered, and I don't remember hearing anything about this in the new tile attributes discovered. There are ways around this, like, you can set the player's cash to a certain amount, which could be used creatively to make it appear to climb. Or, you could spawn a unit in when something happens. Actually putting crates in-game is not something we know how to do yet.

My Heighliner tileset uses harvestable crates for cash, and they can be painted so they're not harvestable if you want some other kinda result from 'em. There are also docked Freighters which could be set to, when discovered in-game, spawn units for the player. I'm sure there are other creative things we could do to replicate the presence of crates in other forms... to some extent.

The image manipulation that allows for easily taking the game to new environments, or putting interesting doodads in, is part of the reason I love D2k so much.

7 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

7. Is there a "everything you need to know" guide of some sort for the later tools and editor? Watching Feda's YouTube tutorials videos. but some stuff seems outdated.

Well, Cm and I did up an events and conditions manual, and an AI manual, but they don't have EVERYTHING in them. If you have any more questions, feel free to ask and we'll get back to ya about it!

7 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

The Baron came over to check out my mapping skills and wasn't very satisfied with my progress.

lmao

If you want to insert an image, check the "Insert other media" thing above "Submit Reply." Insert image from URL works with imgur, but not with Lightshot.
https://prnt.sc/rjbtup

Lightshot is pretty useful. I've been using it a while. You can either upload with it, or just snap screenshots and save them for uploading to, say, imgur. Would recommend picking it up.

Hey, you're making some good progress so far! I see you already have a distinct style. Very aesthetic so far, but also practical. Consideration for infantry rock is important! Are you using the auto-complete feature though? It's not totally perfect. I notice a few tiles in the screenshot have mismatched tiles, which sometimes you might have to fix up. Here: https://prnt.sc/rjbvsk

Once you map for long enough, you'll develop an eye for just that sort of thing.

By the way, unit pathing is an interesting and important part of not only making sure your AI moves its units where you want them to (such as making sure the infantry and vehicles get to the player's base around the same time), but also helping the player focus on the game and not worry about microing his units through small pathways. So, bridges like the ones in BLOXXMAS can be expanded like this...
https://prnt.sc/rjbxxx

And although not that much of a problem with infantry since five of them can be crammed into a single tile, it's still nice to have more room to move around. So if you want to expand that infantry-only, you could do something like... this!
https://prnt.sc/rjbys4

Hope that helps.

[Cm_blast]

12 hours ago, Fey said:

Although a .mis file isn't really necessary for a multi-player map usually, you might want one for some reason or another. @Klofkac, if "no .mis file is found for this map," do you suppose you could have the editor ask if you want to create one? Anyway, if you want to assign one to the map, that's easy. Just copy an existing one and give it the right name. For instance, if the map is called "test.map" then the .mis file needs to be named "_test.mis" and there you have it. X out of the editor, start it up, load your map, then hit F10 or F11 and see what pops up.

I think it is better to hit the "assign .mis file" on the top menu to have a empty script and add things from there, but maybe an importing option won't be a bad idea either; on my "randomized" campaign I prepared a .mis with the random script part written and save it in a separated file, so while creating new maps I copy-paste-rename for every new map; so having a "import .mis" option could be helpfull.

Edited March 20, 2020 by Cm_blast

[AZ-Stalker]

Too many things to reply to at this moment, so I'll get back to your individual posts a bit later. For now a few more questions:

8. How to set a House as non-targetable, as if targeting an Ally. But without them being revealed on the map due to an alliance? Neutral works but can turn hostile so not ideal.

9. Mission failed trigger if your units damage a specific House's buildings or units? Like just one shot and it triggers the fail event. Advice?

10. Mission failed state reveals locations of enemy and neutral Houses in the last 2-3 seconds before the map ends. Why?

11. How can I rename a Sardaukar unit or give him more health for example?

12. How to change the message text color?

13. How to change the House colors?

14. How to delay a reinforcement carryall arrival after it has been triggered? Example: Reinforcement conditions met, it's triggered, but I need it to not arrive instantly.

I'm making a campaign. First mission is pretty much done and scripted. Just requires a bit of testing and polish, hence the questions above. I'll get back to your posts and share the level once I grab a bit more time. I'd upload a screenshot, but I don't want to spoil anything on my first map. Thanks everyone!

Edited March 20, 2020 by AZ-Stalker

[Fey]

3 hours ago, Cm_blast said:

I think it is better to hit the "assign .mis file" on the top menu to have a empty script and add things from there, but maybe an importing option won't be a bad idea either; on my "randomized" campaign I prepared a .mis with the random script part written and save it in a separated file, so while creating new maps I copy-paste-rename for every new map; so having a "import .mis" option could be helpfull.

Oh. Lol I totally keep forgetting about that function. My bad!

58 minutes ago, AZ-Stalker said:

8. How to set a House as non-targetable, as if targeting an Ally. But without them being revealed on the map due to an alliance? Neutral works but can turn hostile so not ideal.

Another limitation. The other House MUST be neutral or enemy to not appear on the minimap.

There are ways around this one too. My campaign has a LOT of maps where the player needs to go discover an ally somewhere and be like "hey buddy, remember me?" You can even add a special message in place of the "becomes hostile" message like maybe the friendly commander tells you to check your fire or something. Friendly fire! Importantly, make sure you set the player's allegiance to the faction you want to be neutral as "Ally" and that faction can be neutral towards the player. The player will not get the option to attack that target, but attacking the ally will result in both the player and that faction becoming hostile towards each-other.

You could even make the AI act very defensively so it keeps to itself while the player completes his objectives, even if the player does wind up attacking accidentally - but in a multi-player match, remember, one AI is for every side for some reason. I know, it's a total hassle. I've been thinking about how I would do a co-op campaign, using tech limits and such to make two AIs build different stuff, reinforcement drops could help, but the more complex behaviors...

58 minutes ago, AZ-Stalker said:

9. Mission failed trigger if your units damage a specific House's buildings or units? Like just one shot and it triggers the fail event. Advice?

Impossible. However, you can tell the game that one casualty = failure. Perhaps that would suffice.

58 minutes ago, AZ-Stalker said:

10. Mission failed state reveals locations of enemy and neutral Houses in the last 2-3 seconds before the map ends. Why?

Because the game said so, so screw you. XD

This is another unfortunate behavior. It's luckily not something that anyone seems to pay attention to, especially not on faster speeds because the map ends much quicker at max speed, but I do make sure to fix any bugs with it. Like, any dialogue that's meant to pop up when the player reveals a tile can be set to only be said when player's units destroyed = false.

58 minutes ago, AZ-Stalker said:

11. How can I rename a Sardaukar unit or give him more health for example?

Putting a commander unit on the field?

You can put a different name for anything you want on any map. Changing the stats of a unit, like HP, requires a mod. I recommend picking up TibEd if you haven't already. It can give you a bunch of neat modding options. Lots of campaigns use mods, and getting a player to play with them is very easy because if you pack up your zip a certain way, the mod is put into place with the maps. A backup folder can be provided easily, and used to return the game to normal with the same simple copy + paste.

D2k might be simple, and limited in certain ways due to its simplicity, but it certainly makes it easier to jump in and enjoy it!

58 minutes ago, AZ-Stalker said:

12. How to change the message text color?

Bah, I'd love to change this one. I had a look through the data.r16 graphics database and found no text characters. The letters are surely around somewhere, I just haven't found them yet. When they are found, it should be a simple matter of replacing the sprites...

58 minutes ago, AZ-Stalker said:

13. How to change the House colors?

This one's easier. You can use a colors.bin file to precisely change the House colors, or you can use allocation indexes. Allocation indexes actually change the FACTION, meaning you can set three different AIs to allocation index 1, and ALL of them will show up as Harkonnen. This is one of D2k's really cool features where you can make it appear as though a single AI is controlling a large base and producing stuff quickly when, really, it's several different AIs controlling different parts of that base. It takes some extra work to make it convincing.

Campaign maps can use allocation indexes above 7. This results in distorted colors, usually, but sometimes they can look pretty cool. My smugglers campaign changes from smuggler tech tree to mercenary halfway through, so the allocation index the player goes by is 35. This is usually dark brown, but if you mess with the video settings, it can make the player appear red in-game instead. Either way, it's different from the orange color the mercenaries are wearing. Some allocation indexes have consistent colors, like allocation index 98 is a red and black Ordos. Very cool. The only problem is, you can't change the color of a faction on its own. The colors are tied to the factions, so allocation indexes are the only way to make, say, (mostly) green Atreides in the original game (allocation index 13, for instance).

Multi-player maps can only use the original 8 allocation indexes, 1-7, IIRC. Colors should be based on whatever's selected in the pre-game lobby. Also, testing them by yourself will result in some weird phenomena where the correct allocation indexes don't appear, where if you have two players at least, uhh... right, I forgot about this. In multi-player games, all factions' pre-placed structures default to Atreides, even if they are not Atreides. 😅 Something about the structures loading in before the factions, and Atreides is the default. So, I guess the correct allocation indexes won't appear, period, unless FunkyFresh fixes that issue. He identified the problem, we know that, but I haven't heard he's fixed it yet.

We're limited either way. Don't be disheartened though! And don't be fooled. There is a LOT you can do with this game. Just get creative, and try not to ask too much!

58 minutes ago, AZ-Stalker said:

14. How to delay a reinforcement carryall arrival after it has been triggered? Example: Reinforcement conditions met, it's triggered, but I need it to not arrive instantly.

This is a bit tricky, but try having a reinforcement Carryall drop somewhere in an inaccessible part of the map. Let it let out a ton of junk units, and then have the trigger unit spawn at the very end. Once you know how the timing works out, you can add a timer that will hit 0 when the trigger unit spawns.

Once the trigger unit spawns, simply say, "if X unit exists, Y reinforcements drop." Y reinforcements being the real reinforcements.

I use this sort of technique to have conversations play out. Example:
https://youtu.be/uUcxiTGVIWk?t=10

This short escort mission involves a LOT of dialogue and delays, where you escort the brown Sardaukar past Imperial forces. Regarding re-naming units, you might notice that infantry unit has a unique name if moused over, as does the Fremen Fedaykin. They are the characters talking. Although I'm not sure arma actually does mouse over them for long enough... anyway, the reinforcements dropping off the side of the map is why the conversation has delays in it. Pretty neat trick, huh?

You could also have, say, a Light Infantry become hostile towards a Gun Turret off the side of the map, and when the Gun Turret is destroyed, the reinforcements drop. That would be for a longer timer. However, you could still hear the sound of the Light Infantry shooting, so this is not necessarily a good idea unless you can put those two FAR away from the player, a la S15 where you're on the total opposite side of the map to the dummy triggers and can't hear a thing.

58 minutes ago, AZ-Stalker said:

I'm making a campaign. First mission is pretty much done and scripted. Just requires a bit of testing and polish, hence the questions above. I'll get back to your posts and share the level once I grab a bit more time. I'd upload a screenshot, but I don't want to spoil anything on my first map. Thanks everyone!

I'm very excited. New stuff is always awesome. Glad to have ya mate, welcome to the community, hope you have fun mapping! There's a lot more to discover about D2k, so explore all your options. Mapping Monster Cm could attest to this.

[Cm_blast]

6 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

9. Mission failed trigger if your units damage a specific House's buildings or units? Like just one shot and it triggers the fail event. Advice?

The short answerd it's no, but could be almost possible this way:
Let's say you are Atreides, that specific house it's Fremen; being neutral toward you. When you "hit" them they become hostile and start firing you, so here you can set the game to fail if they loose even a single unit; however, these Fremen must be allied with anything else (and at reverse)... unless the map it's heavily based on "keeping all the fremen alive at any cost". So, like Fey was saying in his post. (they can be allied or enemy, but as enemy you know sooner or later they will loose a unit, unless you use a very clever idea to avoid that).

For the record, there are lots of things "not possible" but with enough twist-script and smart ideas that you can do that "thing" or almost as similar as the original intent.

4 hours ago, Fey said:

This is another unfortunate behavior. It's luckily not something that anyone seems to pay attention to, especially not on faster speeds because the map ends much quicker at max speed, but I do make sure to fix any bugs with it. Like, any dialogue that's meant to pop up when the player reveals a tile can be set to only be said when player's units destroyed = false.

I think this happen since gruntmods/funky times, due the multiplayer-online feature or something.

4 hours ago, Fey said:

11. How can I rename a Sardaukar unit or give him more health for example?

Like Fey said, you can change the name editing a file called "text.uib", renaming the "sardaukar" entrance to a different name and then saving the file (with different name to avoid loosing original value), but then all the sardaukars will be called with that new name.

Adding health per se it's easy, it can be done with, dunno, 5 clicks if you use Tibed. so if you are targeting to small changes (more health to Sardaukar, less money cost to X specific unit) and things like that it's really easy. Changing that the imperial can train Sardaukar withouth the imperial palace while the Harkonnen cannot do that that's much more complicated.

There isn't specific tutorials for these tools, although for Tibed it may be some here and there, even if it is based on other westwood games.

4 hours ago, Fey said:

6 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

13. How to change the House colors?

 

Fey explained a lot; there is a file called "colour.bin", you can either use hex editing or a tool that funky added that make that task much more easily. It is somewhere on the index if you want to make them in orange or cyan or whatever, although as Fey said, some of those index may have a color you may have and avoid the trouble of editing that colour.bin (that you need to have 2 versions if you want to recover the original state at some point).

4 hours ago, Fey said:

14. How to delay a reinforcement carryall arrival after it has been triggered? Example: Reinforcement conditions met, it's triggered, but I need it to not arrive instantly.

There is a way to do this more easily than fey said, although his way you have much more control.

On top of the condition met, you can add a timer to trigger at, let's say, every 1 minutes in loop.
So let's say the condition it's to destroy the Refinery, and then a reinforcements. With the "minute loop" added:
-You destroy the refinery at 1:25 of game time, the reinforcements won't appear until 35 seconds later, (at 2 minutes).
- It can happen that if you destroy the ref at 1:55, it only takes 5 seconds for that reinforcement to arrive.

Either you want to have full control so every-game behaves the same (Fey complicated method) or you make it a bit more unpredictable with this much more easy way <-- I usually do the method Fey sais on my own campaigns to have full control so the reinforcements always arrive exactly 25 seconds later everygame, but if you don't care that much about that the other method can work (people use it in the past).

6 hours ago, AZ-Stalker said:

I'm making a campaign. First mission is pretty much done and scripted. Just requires a bit of testing and polish, hence the questions above. I'll get back to your posts and share the level once I grab a bit more time. I'd upload a screenshot, but I don't want to spoil anything on my first map. Thanks everyone!

I have a question for you. Not going to ask about factions, storys or that (unless you want); the surprise it's also good.
But I would like to know if you are going to do a progressive campaign: starting with trikes, infantry for the first map, and getting more units the more maps are going; or you are going to fo "full tech" that on the first map you are already producing missile tanks and stuff that advance.

Now since I know for sure that you are making a campaign, remember about the index thing, so you can make 6 Ais to play as Harkonnen. And about other index that have other colors (although are more mixed or looks a bit ugly), we can pass you the list that was done back in the day; most of them are "black", but even black it's a color you can make use withouth altering any file; they are hard too see on the minimap, but besides that they are playable as normal.

Don't hesitate to open any other maps and look at them; from time to time my missions uses ideas that other people do. Akafeda Merc campaign it's really old but I almost copy 1 of his maps (changing the terrain and events so they are different), but similar feeling overal.

Edited March 20, 2020 by Cm_blast

[Fey]

14 hours ago, Cm_blast said:

but then all the sardaukars will be called with that new name.

Kind of! If there's only ONE allied Sardaukar, it will have that name, and then any enemy ones you mouse over will read "Enemy Unit" without the new name.

Are you attempting to do a co-op campaign, or a single player one, by the way? I know a few things about how co-op maps work, but single player maps, we happen to know a lot more about. And they tend to be easier to work with.

[AZ-Stalker]

On 3/20/2020 at 10:40 PM, Cm_blast said:

But I would like to know if you are going to do a progressive campaign: starting with trikes, infantry for the first map, and getting more units the more maps are going; or you are going to go "full tech" that on the first map you are already producing missile tanks and stuff that advance.

Not going to strictly follow a tech level approach as with the original campaigns, but the tech will be integrated naturally with regard to the mission at hand. Check out my first mission to see what I mean. Some things at the end will be your starting units on the next mission.

On 3/21/2020 at 1:36 PM, Fey said:

Are you attempting to do a co-op campaign, or a single player one, by the way?

I decided to go with singleplayer at the moment. I've put coop aside for now to learn easier.

So I couldn't get the separate file to work and rename the Sardaukar for this mission alone, and I don't know how to put the mission in game in order to get the briefing to show up, so please enlighten me. You've been so detailed and helpful and I'm very grateful for all the help. I'm including the first mission I've made so you can try it out and see how I'm doing in learning all of this. Not going to make a separate thread for the campaign until I'm certain that it'll actually be a thing. Still in the learning process right now.

Another thing that I couldn't get to work is the friendly fire message appearing after you shoot one of your allies. I set it to IF Casuality = 1. It never happens in testing. Thoughts?

 

(everything you read beyond this point is a prototype and might change in the future)
A short introduction to my campaign - House Redzani:

The story is that a long forgotten and hidden away minor House has set in motion an operation on Arrakis. The leader of this house, the Knight Commander (you) has had a vision of two branching paths of how his story plays out. One lead to his death and the destruction of his House, while the other saw him discovering something on Arrakis that would ensure a brighter future. What exactly that is is anyone's guess, as he didn't understand what he saw as clearly as he had hoped. And so the Knight Commander, who is a former Sardaukar that saved a dying House and was therefore accepted into it, sends in his limited forces in secret, and shortly after follows to join them - but it's not that simple. Keeping his arrival secret was integral to the vision he saw, and if he was to be discovered by the Emperor via the Spacing Guild on a highliner, the vision would no longer hold any validity, and that wasn't a risk he could take. House Redzani officially listed as a Mercenary group to buy Ordos equipment and avoid any unwanted attention, but also acquired Ixian technology that would mask the Knight Commander's life signs from the likes of Guild Navigators and anyone who could detect him en route. He was frozen in a protective cryo-stasis pod until safely at the hidden Redzani base on Arrakis. And this is where the first mission begins, just as the Knight Commander is arriving, in a secluded mountainous region...

Quote

[ RZ-Com Support AI Activated ]

Knight Commander of House Redzani, you have abruptly awoken from your cryo-stasis pod ahead of schedule. Your aerial transport was shot down before reaching our hidden base on Arrakis.

Source of encountered hostility - unknown.
Available forces - transport crash survivors.

Limited scans of the area show that you are not far from the base with a reasonable chance of reaching it alive on foot. Do note, however, that the base's stealth capabilities prevent me from setting an accurate waypoint.

Operational advice - start walking... seriously.
Regional caution - expect unknown hostiles and sandworm activity.

The Arrakis operation depends on your survival.

MISSION OBJECTIVES:

1. Locate and reach our hidden base.
2. Secure the base if there is any immediate threat.

Yeah, a bit of a plot twist, the Knight Commander somehow has an AI helping him. It'll fit into the story going forward. So just bare with it, as it's kind of a big deal after the whole whoops we made AIs and then banned and destroyed them all thingamajigg.

Please let me know what you think of it and any advice you feel I might benefit from! Eager to hear what you think of my first mission!

Note: I might change it from this version going forward, depending on any fixes or adjustments. It's not meant to be a hard mission, as it's the introduction, but you can in fact lose if you're not careful.

 

Redzani M1 v1.0 (by AZ-Stalker).rar

Edited March 23, 2020 by AZ-Stalker
EDIT Had a missing structure. Reuploaded files.