Newbie DarkRadiant Questions

[Shadowhide]

how to change difficultly names ?

[Springheel]

http://wiki.thedarkmod.com/index.php?title=Difficulty_Levels#Changing_the_Difficulty_Level_Names

[Shadowhide]

ok,thanks

 

how to make text only briefing fit in less pages ?

 

 

[Shadowhide]

anyone ?

[Fidcal]

If you mean you have some blank pages at the end you need to set num_pages in your xdata near the top...

 

"num_pages": "1"

 

Or do you mean you have too much text and want it rewritten more concisely, more abbreviated? I might be able to help if you upload and pm me the url.

 

Or do you mean can the display be changed to fit in more text, eg, smaller font, more lines?

[Shadowhide]

Or do you mean can the display be changed to fit in more text, eg, smaller font, more lines?

 

dats it

 

 

[Shadowhide]

this text fitting only in 5 pages

 

maps/winterharvest/mission_briefing

{

"num_pages": "5"

 

"page1_body" :

{

"**************************************************************"

}

"page2_body" :

{

"***********************************************************************"

}

"page3_body" :

{

"*********************************************************************************************************"

}

"page4_body" :

{

" *************************************************************************************************** "

}

"page5_body" :

{

"**************************************************************************************************************

 

****************************************************************************************************"

 

 

}

}

Edited July 22, 2011 by Shadowhide

[Fidcal]

Well, this is at your own risk:

 

If you extract guis/mainmenu_briefing.gui from darkmod/tdm_gui01.pk4 using a zip file (it needs to remain in a guis folder.) you can modify it in a plain text editor and include it with your FM.

 

You will note the comment near the top: * Mission Authors: DO NOT EDIT, INCLUDE OR OVERRIDE THIS FILE IN YOUR MISSION PK4.

 

This is because any future changes in Dark Mod might produce conflict. However I am puzzled because many FMs include a file of this name to provid a graphics briefing. It might be that there are some elements in this gui that the code picks up on and treats in a special way. So it might be necessary to more radically change it. Possibly only greebo knows.

 

But anyway, if you want to edit it then look first (near the top) at:

 

#define BRIEFING_TEXT_SCALE 0.30
#define BRIEFING_TEXT_FONT "fonts/carleton"

 

Where you might try reducing the text scale or even change the font. Carleton is a capital letters only font. If you try stone instead or some other small clear font you might find you can fit more on a page.

[stumpy]

is there anyway to add graphics to a gui book, like picture on one page and text on the other page.

[Sotha]

is there anyway to add graphics to a gui book, like picture on one page and text on the other page.

 

Not that I know of. You could of course easily make a custom readable book.

Extract the empty gui book graphic from the darkmod package, write your text there and add the picture with your favourite paint program. Then provide the image with your mission and make it into a custom readable, like you would make an ingame map (check wiki).

[Fidcal]

Yes, there are two ways.

 

One way is to produce a custom gui to add the particular images. I tried this a couple of years back and it worked but I could see it adding the images in real time. While that is acceptable in a web page it didn't look right while scouring a dusty old tome down in a crypt. (But note this was on my old system. Possibly with a better performance machine it would be unnoticeable.)

 

The other way is to produce a set of custom guis, one for each page, which uses a different custom background image for each page of the book. I already have such a set of guis for a story book with text on one page and a picture on the opposite page. You would only need to be able to paste your images onto the blank open book background image in a paint program - although I could help you there if needed.

 

Let me know and I'll upload my guis somewhere.

[Melan]

Can I get a confirmation on this?

• If I have lights in my mission that have shaders with the "ambient" flag (e.g. ambientLight2), they will end up increasing the global ambient level even outside their boundaries.

...because the light level has increased in the mission I am working on, maybe subtly, but I think noticeably (it also impacts the lightgem). There are a few lights with the ambient flag, used to light up facades and simulate moonlight. Or is something else to blame?

 

I have been working with a 0.08 ambient level, and could either decrease it to 0.06 (which may be too dark for some, although it looks great on my PC), or stay with 0.08 and use lightgem_offset -1 as suggested here.

[Sotha]

There are a few lights with the ambient flag, used to light up facades and simulate moonlight. Or is something else to blame?

 

I don't know, but why do you want to use multiple ambient world lights? Why not change the local ambient with the location system, which is a really nice and easy way. I mean that outside the ambient is slightly more brigther, so when the player walks outside, the location system changes the light brightness a bit higher.

 

If you want to light up facades and simulate moonrays, why not use normal lights with noshadows or parallel on as describbled here:

http://www.katsbits....-techniques.php

 

I have been working with a 0.08 ambient level, and could either decrease it to 0.06 (which may be too dark for some, although it looks great on my PC), or stay with 0.08 and use lightgem_offset -1 as suggested here.

 

I always use 0.06 nowadays. Nobody has complained about it, so I think it will be okay.

[Melan]

They are already noshadows/nospecular 1 lights, but they use shaders with an ambient flag. I wonder why (I am working with a map section originally built by Tels).

Edited July 24, 2011 by Melan

[nbohr1more]

In Doom 3, if the "AmbientLight" keyword is applied, the light will have no "directionality" which makes it use less resources. TDM's "Enhanced Ambient" adds a cubemap lookup which adds a baked-in direction to the lighting while the "Normal" ambient uses a real-time screen-space calculation to add some shading and directionality.

 

Still, I believe that most of TDM's "Ambient Light" modes are still less resource intensive than "real lights" in most scenarios.

 

As for the affect on the Light Gem, even Ambient World lighting will have an effect. You can only compensate via the Light Gem offset.

 

This is probably obvious but if the origin of the decorative ambient lighting is out away from the surface it is intended to illuminate then you might be getting hit by unintended illumination. Since Ambient light has no directionality you should be able to use tricks like moving the origin inside the wall or surface so that it only illuminates the intended surface. Also, shrink the light size but increase it's RGB values (etc) to make an "overbright" light.

[Fidcal]

The main ambient light, ambient_world, covers the entire map. There are a couple of settings in the menu that turn it off and increase the brightness of textures to simulate ambient light so improving performance but at the cost of a slight loss of quality. This light can be changed dynamically using the location settings described on the wiki @ http://wiki.thedarkmod.com/index.php?title=Location_Settings It is only the special name ambient_world that makes it effective with this and with the menu settings. I suspect these would work (though wrongly) even if the light wasn't actually an ambient light so long as it was named ambient_world.

 

You can have any number of additional ambient lights. They are only effective within their own radius. They add to the light within that radius like any other light. They do not affect the global ambient light outside of that radius. They are independent.

 

So say you have an area where you want an increase of global ambient light you could just stick in an extra ambient light to cover that area and it would add to the light from ambient_world. However, that is two lights so will affect performance. Using the location settings you can instead boost ambient_world (or decrease it which you cannot easily do by just adding another light) when the player enters that area. ambient_world returns to normal on exit from that area.

[Bikerdude]

with the "ambient" flag (e.g. ambientLight2),

Some thing that I'm guessing most people arent fully aware of is the renaming bug, that arg name "ambientLight2" looks suspiciously like its been renames from "ambientLight"...

 

[grayman]

The other way is to produce a set of custom guis, one for each page, which uses a different custom background image for each page of the book. I already have such a set of guis for a story book with text on one page and a picture on the opposite page. You would only need to be able to paste your images onto the blank open book background image in a paint program - although I could help you there if needed.

 

Let me know and I'll upload my guis somewhere.

 

I can't get DR to pay attention to my custom readable gui with a custom background.

 

An example is appreciated.

 

Thanks.

[Fidcal]

Readable guis are in tdm_gui01.pk4 but I assume you know to make one but it doesn't show in DR?

 

Put the gui file in the guis folder or subfolder within it. This can be in the darkmod folder but ultimately in your game folder of course. This full path and gui name goes in the readable xdata file. If you created the readable using the DR readables editor then it should have created the xdata file either in your game or darkmod folder xdata folder. If you open it up in a plain text editor and scroll down to the end of the section (the heading of which should be in the xdata_contents spawnarg of the readable entity in the map) you'll see eg,

 

"gui_page1" : "guis/readables/books/my_book01.gui"

"gui_page2" : "guis/readables/books/my_book02.gui"

"gui_page3" : "guis/readables/books/my_book03.gui"

 

You can have any number of the above each with a different art background picture.

 

Or maybe you're saying the gui is not selectable in the readables editor? I can see and select mine OK from the gui selector but mine was based on an existing book and I just modified the background art. If yours is more custom it might not show in the readables editor and you might need to set it up manually.

 

Remember that you need in addition a world gui (see examples in the above pk4) too if it is visible in-game eg, open book model with a gui surface, but not necessary for closed book.

 

I'm not absolutely clear what the problem is so if you need more clarification then let me or you can upload the relevant files in a pk4 somewhere and pm me the url to look at. Alternatively I can send you mine to examine.

[grayman]

I tried placing the custom gui in

 

<myFM>/guis/

 

<myFM>/guis/readables/

 

<myFM>/guis/readables/sheets/

 

but the readables editor couldn't see it in each case.

 

I'll try the manual route as you suggested, then see if the readables editor acknowledges it.

 

Thanks.

 

 

 

 

[grayman]

Manually creating the xdata entry allows the readables editor to see the custom gui.

 

I'll file an issue against DR for not looking for custom readable guis in the FM folders.

 

Thanks!

[JarlFrank]

Hi, I've worked myself through the dark radiant tutorial and am now trying to build a mission. One question I have is: how do I make a light that is connected to a switch turned off on mission start?

[Sotha]

Hi, I've worked myself through the dark radiant tutorial and am now trying to build a mission. One question I have is: how do I make a light that is connected to a switch turned off on mission start?

 

The light has "start_off" spawnarg or something like that. You can check what spawnargs are available by:

1) select light

2) in the entity inspector right click the spawnarg list.

3) choose add new or similar.

 

You should see what spawnargs are available for the light entity.

[JarlFrank]

Thanks, that helped!

[JarlFrank]

Alright, another question: I've made two toilet seats with brushes, but now I don't know how to make them openable. Any tips?