Tileset .ini files fine-tuned for D2kEditor 1.4 (Heighliner tileset)

[Klofkac]

While I was working on D2kEditor v1.4 itself, I was developing .ini files for several tilesets at the same time in order to immediately test and take advantage of the new editor features. So here I'm going to release the .ini files which I updated to be compatible with D2kEditor 1.4.

At first, here is the Heighliner tileset: Heighliner_Tileset.zip

I updated not only the .ini file, but also updated the attributes .BIN file to utilize the newly available attributes (most importantly Occupied by building) and included the updated TEXT.UIB file with additional tile hint texts, which would display in game when you move mouse at some specific structures.

Here's the complete list of changes I made into tileset and its configuration:
- Added 8 paint groups for 8 different platform types + 4 common groups (Supplies, MD Pads, Concrete and most importantly Void).
- Configured paint tiles in a way that specific platform tiles have higher or lower chance, most importantly platform tile with a small hole in it has lowest chance to be painted.
- Completely rearranged block presets. Presets are now more logically sorted into preset groups, and it should be much easier to place platforms, walls, edges etc.
- Configured the Auto-smooth edge feature to work with all 8 different platform types. This also includes Void, you can use this feature to automatically place edges around the platforms (but only one of three available edge colors).
- Added editor attributes to each respective platform tiles, which makes auto-smooth edges feature work properly, and is used in fill area rules and area types as well.
- Updated minimap color rules: added rules for common paint groups (Supplies, MD Pads, Concrete, Void) and structures (Freighters, Mass Deposits) so that they are drawn in respective side color on minimap. Added rule for supply depot too. The minimap is now much more colourful and easier to distinguish different places.
- Updated fill area rules, taking advantage of the editor attributes
- Configured default paint group to Void, so when you create a new map using Heighliner tileset, all map will become void
- Took advantage of "Occupied by building" attribute and added it to specific structures (Freighters, Mass Deposits) so these structures change mouse cursor to selection cursor and are shown in respective side color on minimap.
- Added Concrete attribute to concrete tiles, so you can place real working concrete in a map
- Took advantage of Tile hint text, added it to Freighters, Mass Deposits, Launch Pad and MD Pad.

I can say, creating maps with Heighliner tileset is now much faster, easier, and more fun! Just don't hesitate and try it out!

One drawback of "Occupied by building" attribute is that when you use incorrect allocation indexes (I mean you use allocation index 2 on Harkonnen side), the special structures will show in wrong color on minimap in game, for example Harkonnen Freighter shows in green color on minimap in game. You can mitigate this by using only corresponding allocation indexes for each side as much as possible (i.e. always index 1 on Harkonnen side and 2 on Ordos side) and when you want to have 2 or 3 independent enemy bases, you would replace allocation index only on the other unused sides (Fremen, Emperor, Smugglers etc).

Some other idea, how you can make this more interesting, is taking advantage of "Occupied by Infantry" attribute, which reveals stealth units.

I'm going to post here also updated configuration for Warcraft 2 snowy tileset, I'm just still not fully done with it yet, struggling with trees and rocks presets.

Edited March 18, 2020 by Klofkac

[Fey]

6 hours ago, Klofkac said:

Heighliner tileset improvements

You are a legend, Klof! This is so cool. I'm grateful my own efforts have gone to good use, and I'm grateful that others are building on them. Thank you!!

[Klofkac]

11 hours ago, Fey said:

You are a legend, Klof! This is so cool. I'm grateful my own efforts have gone to good use, and I'm grateful that others are building on them. Thank you!!

Ye, thanks!

Would you consider updating your tileset on https://forum.dune2k.com/topic/27863-release-heighliner-tileset/ ? Not sure if you will still update your tileset in any way (like adding stars or any more stuff), but would be definitely good to have your tileset ready for D2kEditor 1.4 so anyone can take advantage of it. Ease of mapping with that tileset might encourage people to create more maps and more advanced maps with it.

And if you will do that, please consider changing allocation indexes and swapping sides in your 4-mission mini campaign, so all structures like freighters and mass deposits are shown in proper colors on in-game minimap.

[Fey]

8 hours ago, Klofkac said:

Ye, thanks!

Would you consider updating your tileset on https://forum.dune2k.com/topic/27863-release-heighliner-tileset/ ? Not sure if you will still update your tileset in any way (like adding stars or any more stuff), but would be definitely good to have your tileset ready for D2kEditor 1.4 so anyone can take advantage of it. Ease of mapping with that tileset might encourage people to create more maps and more advanced maps with it.

And if you will do that, please consider changing allocation indexes and swapping sides in your 4-mission mini campaign, so all structures like freighters and mass deposits are shown in proper colors on in-game minimap.

Thank you!

I do plan to add some star images, and I'd love to implement working concrete for each faction just to make something like the turret slots on the tower defense map easier to make. In the tower defense map (here's a link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHP2GDdsjhk), at the very beginning, two Quads shoot at each-other for about three in-game seconds before spontaneously combusting, and they clear out the walls so the player has concrete at each turret slot.

I've been super busy lately, but I'll see what I can do to implement these new things as quickly as I can.

[Klofkac]

5 hours ago, Fey said:

and I'd love to implement working concrete for each faction just to make something like the turret slots on the tower defense map easier to make

Sounds good. Actually I implemented working concrete in my tileset update, but I set "Concrete owner side" attributes to Sandworm, which means, the concrete you paint with Concrete paint group will be a generic concrete nobody can build upon unless there's other building near it. But you can still make more concrete tiles in tileset and assign them more different "Concrete owner side" attributes so you have concrete belonging to Atreides, Harkonnen, Ordos etc. Then you can put these on free preset slots under Structures group. Are you going to anyhow graphically distinguish which side concrete tiles belong to? Like making concrete colored blue, red, green,,,

I was actually looking forward to play your tower defense maps, but I feel I'd like to wait for you to implement this concrete thing and remake your existing maps, if you plan to do this in near future.

[Fey]

2 hours ago, Klofkac said:

Sounds good. Actually I implemented working concrete in my tileset update, but I set "Concrete owner side" attributes to Sandworm, which means, the concrete you paint with Concrete paint group will be a generic concrete nobody can build upon unless there's other building near it. But you can still make more concrete tiles in tileset and assign them more different "Concrete owner side" attributes so you have concrete belonging to Atreides, Harkonnen, Ordos etc. Then you can put these on free preset slots under Structures group. Are you going to anyhow graphically distinguish which side concrete tiles belong to? Like making concrete colored blue, red, green,,,

I was actually looking forward to play your tower defense maps, but I feel I'd like to wait for you to implement this concrete thing and remake your existing maps, if you plan to do this in near future.

I'm not sure about the near future. This campaign is in its "final draft" state (not counting a game-breaking bug that SOMETIMES occurs on S09V2 which I have yet to fix). The tower defense map works just fine! It simply happens to look a little funny in the first three seconds, that's all. If you want to give it a try, it's "SBON3: Against the Storm" in the mission launcher, but I would advise against reading the briefing because there are spoilers that far into the campaign. If you aren't already aware of how things go, that is.

I don't think I'll differentiate in coloration, but I'll certainly arrange them so it's obvious. Like...
0 1 2 3
4 5 6 7

In that sort of formation where it's obvious whose concrete is whose. I'll have to take a look at my nearest opportunity!

Edited March 20, 2020 by Fey

[Cm_blast]

On 3/19/2020 at 4:45 PM, Klofkac said:

(like adding stars or any more stuff)

I am a bit lost here, what are these "stars"? I think you said something in another post too, but was at the time my computer were wrong or I didn't have so I may be a bit lost in the overall.

On 3/18/2020 at 9:47 PM, Klofkac said:

I'm going to post here also updated configuration for Warcraft 2 snowy tileset, I'm just still not fully done with it yet, struggling with trees and rocks presets.

Talking about other tilesets. Can you help me updating a bit the retro one? I am not sure exactly what parts of the .ini are suppose to alter with the new changes. Also, this tileset it's using one of the vanilla .bin, but at some point I may want to add the specific concrete per house and, since I have like half of the tileset with empty, I can set up 8 concretes, one per faction to use. Maybe I don't add a "old ixian building" text or anything, but still making it to change the mouse icon when pointed.
Also, for the concrete per faction, since I have that many room, I guess It's possible to me to add a letter with the faction in a adyacent slot, so I have 8 concrete in a row/column and behind/right written "A, H, O " and so on so people (and myself) will know exactly which concrete it's owner. With this I may alter the "jorney to the past" and even the Dune 2 based one that use the retro tileset and having, at last, buildable concrete all over the AI base.

On the other part; I hope you can help me with all those other .inis I did for the other tilesets, like BLOXTD, BLOXTEM, BLOXSNOW and so on. Here I won't alter the .bin, because it's not my tileset (and they have been using some of these to do online maps, it's not my call to alter other's people work that may not like those changes); but I think the .inis still suffer a bit about the changes like the color on the minimap or other things (I am still not sure exactly what things are going to be altered or not).

But yeah, I hope I can get some help; creating a new .bin for the dune 2 retro tileset it's something I will tackle at some point, but those other custom .ini for other tileset may need a hand to understand what things changed and what not; like the color thing and the rules, I think, those values that now are different, I think. It's starting to be a bit hard to follow all the tools :P, besides the editor, the attributes, the ini, text.uibs, tibed... 

They already have color on the minimap, the rule of "painting spice on land" and group presets. I don't really care if they don't have (or it is not possible) to do the shift+click smooth edge, because on those custom sometimes the graphic it's missing or have like 4 possible corners to use; which also the autosmooth I saw you showing on the bloxcraft it's amazing, but I have no idea how you did it (and yeah, you explained, but like I say early, it's starting to be a bit hard understanding how all these tools, it's lots of info and the moment you stop editing or moding I began to forget how things where done).

I think you even mentioned that now presets and custom blocs can be done more easily or I am imaginaning things? (or you simply grouped Fey tileset and I am thinking on anything else).
For now simply answerd me with a "yes" or "no", don't bother to explain not until I go full-modder-edition to absorb the info.

However, if there is a post you have done at some point that you remember how most of these questions that you already explained, you can paste it for me, It may be beneficial to have that link into the index, for future consultation.

Edited March 21, 2020 by Cm_blast

[Fey]

45 minutes ago, Cm_blast said:

I am a bit lost here, what are these "stars"? I think you said something in another post too, but was at the time my computer were wrong or I didn't have so I may be a bit lost in the overall.

A common complaint about the Heighliner tileset is that there is nothing that can be put in the "void" tiles. You'd think there'd be some stars or something in the background, but it IS meant to be the deck on the inside of a ship. I've reasoned that it's pitch black because the hull of the ship is in the way of the stars, but still, it would be a nice doodad to have... so, I was thinking of adding some star images to the Heighliner tileset so the void can be filled with something if desired.

[Cm_blast]

7 hours ago, Fey said:

A common complaint about the Heighliner tileset is that there is nothing that can be put in the "void" tiles. You'd think there'd be some stars or something in the background, but it IS meant to be the deck on the inside of a ship. I've reasoned that it's pitch black because the hull of the ship is in the way of the stars, but still, it would be a nice doodad to have... so, I was thinking of adding some star images to the Heighliner tileset so the void can be filled with something if desired.

Oooooooh, you mean literally, just the starts you can see on the sky or space. Alright, I was thinking on a marked like the sandworm/player spawn on the attributes and I was "wait, what kind of starts have to do with attributes that I am missing?".

[Klofkac]

On 3/21/2020 at 4:48 PM, Cm_blast said:

Can you help me updating a bit the retro one? I am not sure exactly what parts of the .ini are suppose to alter with the new changes.

I may help you, but I was quite busy last days. It would be good if you can understand the changes in .ini file and how things are working, for example by looking into the Warcraft 2 tileset configuration I posted there. Then you can do some changes yourself. I already took a look into Dune 2 tileset, and unfortunately, making auto-smooth feature working with this tileset would not be easily possible because the edges in Dune 2 tileset work in completely different way from Dune2000 and other tilesets (I hope you understand what I mean).

On 3/21/2020 at 4:48 PM, Cm_blast said:

I may want to add the specific concrete per house and, since I have like half of the tileset with empty, I can set up 8 concretes, one per faction to use.

It is possible to make concrete per house, but probably this is not strictly needed. Basically you use pre-placed concrete in enemy bases, however, the enemy is not building any new buildings (it's not practice mode) so for the enemy it does not matter which side the concrete belongs to. For the "Concrete" paint button I usually use the 3 concrete tiles located in tileset used by game, and give them "Concrete + Concrete owner side = Sandworm" attributes. Which means it's a "Generic" concrete which belongs to Sandworm, and no side can build on it unless their own building is located near. The "Generic" concrete could be used in enemy bases, the whole purpose is only that you can build on it once you manage to build a construction yard in enemy base or capture enemy building.

In case you as player have pre-built base with concrete in it, then yes, it might be useful to have "Your" concrete.

On 3/21/2020 at 4:48 PM, Cm_blast said:

On the other part; I hope you can help me with all those other .inis I did for the other tilesets, like BLOXTD, BLOXTEM, BLOXSNOW and so on.

Same answer - I can help, but try what you can.

On 3/21/2020 at 4:48 PM, Cm_blast said:

I think you even mentioned that now presets and custom blocs can be done more easily or I am imaginaning things? (or you simply grouped Fey tileset and I am thinking on anything else).

Yes, that is right.

On 3/21/2020 at 4:48 PM, Cm_blast said:

However, if there is a post you have done at some point that you remember how most of these questions that you already explained, you can paste it for me, It may be beneficial to have that link into the index, for future consultation.

Maybe you could read through the changelog of D2kEditor 1.4, there I tried to summarize all things.

[Cm_blast]

1 hour ago, Klofkac said:

I may help you, but I was quite busy last days. It would be good if you can understand the changes in .ini file and how things are working, for example by looking into the Warcraft 2 tileset configuration I posted there. Then you can do some changes yourself. I already took a look into Dune 2 tileset, and unfortunately, making auto-smooth feature working with this tileset would not be easily possible because the edges in Dune 2 tileset work in completely different way from Dune2000 and other tilesets (I hope you understand what I mean).

No rushing. Even if it takes 2 months it's fine with me; even if I finally began to do my campaign that tileset it's not going to be used so, take your time.
Alright; I may try to do after I figure out by looking on that warcraft 2, and if I fail to do it I will question you.

1 hour ago, Klofkac said:

It is possible to make concrete per house, but probably this is not strictly needed. Basically you use pre-placed concrete in enemy bases, however, the enemy is not building any new buildings (it's not practice mode) so for the enemy it does not matter which side the concrete belongs to. For the "Concrete" paint button I usually use the 3 concrete tiles located in tileset used by game, and give them "Concrete + Concrete owner side = Sandworm" attributes. Which means it's a "Generic" concrete which belongs to Sandworm, and no side can build on it unless their own building is located near. The "Generic" concrete could be used in enemy bases, the whole purpose is only that you can build on it once you manage to build a construction yard in enemy base or capture enemy building.

In case you as player have pre-built base with concrete in it, then yes, it might be useful to have "Your" concrete.

Ooooh yeah, I forgot I had already a "you can build on top" concrete tile; the campaign based on dune 2 (and the retro version) don't have concretes placed on the map directly, but I forgot that for the Jorney on the past I already have at least 1 generic so yeah; I won't add it.

1 hour ago, Klofkac said:

Same answer - I can help, but try what you can.

Alright, at the point I will try that at least I hope you can tell me the "basic"; I mean, those other .inis are using .bin done from other people which I won't touch, so it's more about knowing what parts of the .ini itself are still valid and which ones are "outdated" (if any).

1 hour ago, Klofkac said:

(CUSTOM BLOCKS) Yes, that is right.

But is still the same code right? the "2.2.20.12" and that, but now by clicking (or whatever way you did it) the program reconice the tiles and do the "code" automatically.

1 hour ago, Klofkac said:

Maybe you could read through the changelog of D2kEditor 1.4, there I tried to summarize all things.

Alright. By the way, about to add the editor into the index unless you are waiting for a 1.4.1 version or something.
Also, if I add it, do you want me to keep the other 2 versions, removing boths or having at least the previous one just in case?

Edited March 23, 2020 by Cm_blast

[Klofkac]

7 hours ago, Cm_blast said:

Ooooh yeah, I forgot I had already a "you can build on top" concrete tile; the campaign based on dune 2 (and the retro version) don't have concretes placed on the map directly, but I forgot that for the Jorney on the past I already have at least 1 generic so yeah; I won't add it.

You could still add "Concrete" and "Concrete owner side" attributes to Dune 2 tileset, so that the concrete really behaves as concrete (can be destroyed, buildings won't damage on it). Currently you made the concrete buildable, but it's only visual, you still need to place concrete over the tiles to make it real concrete.

7 hours ago, Cm_blast said:

But is still the same code right? the "2.2.20.12" and that, but now by clicking (or whatever way you did it) the program reconice the tiles and do the "code" automatically.

I allowed three different ways to specify block preset in .ini file.
1. continuous block, the old way (2.2.20.12) for backwards compatibility, so old tileset .ini files would still work without rewriting everything
2. continuous block, the new way (2.2.260) where the number is tile index, you can use Preset Helper feature to automatically generate the numbers
3. custom block (-2.-2.260.261.280.281) where width and height are negative, following list of individual tile indexes. You can use Preset Helper feature to automatically generate the numbers

7 hours ago, Cm_blast said:

Alright. By the way, about to add the editor into the index unless you are waiting for a 1.4.1 version or something.
Also, if I add it, do you want me to keep the other 2 versions, removing boths or having at least the previous one just in case?

Well, let's add it to index and to D2K+ side for download once I release the very final 1.4 version. The version I released is not the very final, I told I'll still be doing some small changes based on recent experience.

You can keep older versions, but rather only for historical purposes. People should use the latest version, as it provides the best features and bug fixes from the previous versions.

[Cm_blast]

5 hours ago, Klofkac said:

You could still add "Concrete" and "Concrete owner side" attributes to Dune 2 tileset, so that the concrete really behaves as concrete (can be destroyed, buildings won't damage on it). Currently you made the concrete buildable, but it's only visual, you still need to place concrete over the tiles to make it real concrete.

Yes, but it was for the visual of the AI based covered in concretes just like the original game; did you try how the AI behave with prefabricated concrete? I mean, if the Ai still reconize being the owner of that concrete and use it correctly; AI it's really weird on how behaves; and sometimes it cannot build a turret destroyed because the presence of walls convering around the turret, he build concrete, cancel, build concrete, cancel, build concrete, cancel... only when he loose another building the circle it's broken.

To test this it would be needed 1 turret surrounded by concrete owned by them, and then you destroy it with a saboteur or troopers, and then using debug to jump into AI control and see if the AI actually can build and place concrete into that spot fine or has trouble because "hey, I know those are my concrete, but I didn't build them myself, so I don't trush that concrete". Just like a unit produced or spawned acts different that a unit placed directly.

5 hours ago, Klofkac said:

Well, let's add it to index and to D2K+ side for download once I release the very final 1.4 version. The version I released is not the very final, I told I'll still be doing some small changes based on recent experience.

You can keep older versions, but rather only for historical purposes. People should use the latest version, as it provides the best features and bug fixes from the previous versions.

Alright. I'll wait until the final release.

[Klofkac]

18 hours ago, Cm_blast said:

did you try how the AI behave with prefabricated concrete? I mean, if the Ai still reconize being the owner of that concrete and use it correctly; AI it's really weird on how behaves; and sometimes it cannot build a turret destroyed because the presence of walls convering around the turret, he build concrete, cancel, build concrete, cancel, build concrete, cancel... only when he loose another building the circle it's broken.

To test this it would be needed 1 turret surrounded by concrete owned by them, and then you destroy it with a saboteur or troopers, and then using debug to jump into AI control and see if the AI actually can build and place concrete into that spot fine or has trouble because "hey, I know those are my concrete, but I didn't build them myself, so I don't trush that concrete". Just like a unit produced or spawned acts different that a unit placed directly.

Nope, I did not do any experimenting with AI involved during my attributes research.

You can do this experimenting yourself, if you want. I'm expecting, that AI would consider the pre-placed concrete as their own concrete (provided you set "concrete owner side" attributes properly). Best would be to use practice AI and watch where the AI would or would not build.