TDM Editors Guild Latest Topics

Darkmod: Inspiration thread

Wed, 18 Aug 2010 00:00:12 +0000

If like me you scour the web looking for inspiration for your next TDM mission then look no further..

Now... talking of images have you guys seen the latest from the master that is DrK from his Rocksbourg4 campaign. We need more dirty texture in TDM me thinks...

So, what are you working on right now?

Tue, 20 Oct 2009 18:20:26 +0000

Looks like we need one of these. Use this to post images or teasers of whatever you happen to be working on at the moment. Sharing feels good, and can inspire other people to keep working on their own maps.

Use spoilers if appropriate!

Better underwater gui?

Wed, 10 Jun 2026 12:47:36 +0000

So one of things that has always bugged me is how under water gui's dont become more opaque at distance. How would I edit this so it behaves more like a fog light..?

Newbie DarkRadiant Questions

Tue, 24 Mar 2009 21:18:43 +0000

I think it would be smart to go ahead and start a "Newbie thread" that covers all newbie questions in one place, as with the TDS Forum. It doesn't have to be this one, just for future reference.

Aaanyway, I was going through the A-Z Tutorial, and right about the time you make the pool of water, I fixed some leaks, thought I got them all. Now it won't Dmap again, but when I hit Pointfile, it says "Could not open pointfile: E:/games/ ... /TutorialMap.lin" I don't know why since it's been working up to now.

So if I have a leak I can't find it, but it's troubling just that Pointfile suddenly, inexplicably doesn't open! There isn't any ".lin" file either; not sure what happened to it.

Any ideas?

Edit: I started a map from scratch and Pointfile didn't show up again. So whatever it is, it isn't something I messed up in that first map, but a general problem I'm having with DR.

Edit2: But it does Dmap and Map just fine, so that's ok.

Mapping with vertex blended terrain patches:

Wed, 19 Aug 2026 12:40:20 +0000

So as many mappers may know, getting NPC's to path find over the top of func_static patch based terrain is a ball ache. The current method is to place lots of perpendicular MC brush at varying heights under the patch, loosely aligned to the surface of the terrain etc.

When the terrain brush is all one texture type, the above is a viable solution. But when you introduce vertex painted terrain patches, the issue of different foot sounds becomes a question. As in for reasons I don't understand yet, you only hear one foot sound type, eg grass or stone etc.

So I came up with a technique that I don't know if anyone has used before. To get around the foot sound issue, I place a nodraw solid brush (NDS) with different textures (grass/stone/etc) to cover the different parts of the terrain .

And as every mapper knows, trying to raise/lower the vert point of a square brush, inevitably causes other verts to move when you don't want them too. So my solution was cut the square brush up into triangles, so for a square brush that's 4 triangles.

Here is an example of a large vertex painting terrain brush, with 3 different textures that I have placed a bunch of NDS brush under.

Arcturus' animations

Tue, 01 Jan 2013 23:17:08 +0000

I continue the work on the animations with the new Blender rig. Walkcycle:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nozToZMIFR8&feature=youtu.be

It's only 2 frames shorter than current animations, so it's rather similar to walk1.md5anim now.

Question: multple security cameras - one security monitor

Wed, 22 Jul 2026 18:24:17 +0000

In my wip I will have upto 10 security camera's, I have built a little security monitor and via a button, I would like to cycle/toggle the view between the camera's.

Amadeus suggested a 'trigger_sequencer', so I pointed the CameraGUI at this via cameraTarget arg and all that happens is the view is the 'trigger_sequencer' sees, which is obviously not what I want. The wiki dosent appear to have an article for this.

Any help or suggestions would be welcome.

Problem: Knocking out NPC's kills them.

Thu, 02 Jul 2026 08:55:27 +0000

So am doing a bug fix pass on 'Business as usual' and would like to know, what is the simplest way to prevent this from happening?

I have made the beds noclipmodel, placed nodrawsolid brush just under the surface of the bed and also placed monsterclip brush around the bloody bed.

Problem: "_prt_gen" folder not being created.

Wed, 01 Jul 2026 13:49:58 +0000

What would cause "runParticle" "mapname" command to not create the '_prt_gen' folder..?

How to Teleport AI with Bind/Def_Attached Props

Mon, 22 Jun 2026 12:53:42 +0000

I wanted to keep some hostile thugs in an isolated box outside the map, but teleport them in after an objective is achieved and have them patrol the (previously safe) area. In basic terms, I can do that by triggering an atdm:teleport. The only problem with this is any props I attach via either bind or def_attach doesn't move with them.

I expected with with the bind method (in my case, a note attached to the belt) and compensated with another atdm:teleport to move it too, though it was difficult to place it exactly where I wanted. But I don't understand why the def_attach method doesn't move the object with them.

In particular, I wanted some of the thugs to be holding lanterns while they patrol. Adding the spawnargs to put lanterns in their hands results in the lanterns being left behind in their storage area when they teleport. Oddly, this doesn't seem to affect their weapons (which, afaik, are also given them via def_attach). Should I be using a different teleport method (ie. scripting) to make this work, or is there some other trick to it?

Thanks if anybody can help with this.

Experimental Feature: Improving GUIs by supporting anchoring windowDefs

Mon, 15 Jun 2026 20:37:03 +0000

Doom3/TDM GUIs use a 640x480 coordinate system and assume that the player uses a 4:3 resolution, otherwise they'll look stretched.

Most TDM GUIs assume that they will be stretched to 16:9, i.e. pixels aren't square (which makes writing GUIs pretty painful, I guess) and when using a non-16:9-resolution things look stretched.

TDM added the forcescreenaspect window variable that will prevent a windowDef from being stretched when used with hcenter that can be used to have something undistorted on the center of the screen, but it's still pretty limited (and barely used) - and as far as I can tell child-windowDefs of that will still be stretched.

Anyway, CstDoom3 2.0 introduced Anchored GUIs which allow anchoring windowDefs to a corner or center of the screen and prevents them (and everything contained in them) from being stretched.

Those anchored windowDefs are mostly limited to 640x480 virtual pixels (scaled to screensize, as much as possible while keeping the aspect ratio), so regardless of the window's resolution, they will remain unstretched (well, except for those anchor cases that explicitly stretch in one direction, like anchoring just to the top instead of top center or top left or whatever).

This allows for example to anchor the weapon_display windowdef to the lower left corner of the screen, the lightgem to the lower center of the screen and the current item to the lower right corner of the screen. No matter how wide or tall the window is, they will remain there, unstretched.

I think these screenshots illustrate it pretty well:

For dhewm3 1.5.5 I ported them to dhewm3 and greatly improved them, for example they can now also be used for regular (interactive) menus, while in CstDoom3 they only worked with noninteractive fullscreen GUIs like the HUD (mouse positions weren't calculated correctly).

This feature is documented in detail at https://github.com/dhewm/dhewm3/blob/master/docs/GUIs.md#aspect-ratio-independent-guis-covering-the-whole-screen-with-cstdoom3s-anchors

Now I ported that to The Dark Mod, with just two little changes:

There is no scaling of menus to 4:3 with letterboxing, so the window variable scaleto43 is not needed or even supported
Most of TDM's GUIs assume that they'll be stretched to 16:9, even though using the 640x480 4:3 coordinate system. To accommodate this, I added the cstAssumes16_9 window variable.

cstAssumes16_9 1 will cause the anchored windowDef, that would normally have a 4:3 aspect ratio, to be stretched by factor 1.333 (in width), just like it would when stretching to a 16:9 resolution. So when porting existing GUIs to this system, you don't have to recalculate the coordinates - if they were meant to be stretched, add a "cstAssumes16_9 1" line to the windowDef (and "cstAnchor CST_ANCHOR_BOTTOM_LEFT" line or similar, of course) and it should work in most cases.

By the way, this is completely backwards-compatible, so if your .gui doesn't use cstAnchor, it will continue to work just like before.

At https://github.com/DanielGibson/thedarkmod-mirror/pull/1 you can find a testbuild for Windows with this enabled, some ported GUIs, more information and the code changes.

Currently this is an experimental patch, I don't know when or if it will be merged to the official TDM source.

Please check it out and play around with this feature and let me know how you like it and if you run into problems!

I've ported most of the HUD, but there's still a lot of GUIs that would benefit from being ported, like the inventory menu, the main menu and more.
TBH those seem pretty complex so I'd appreciate help from someone who's familiar with their code

Making textures on models with alpha cast shadows:

Wed, 10 Jun 2026 10:14:21 +0000

So TDM has a lot of textures with alpha, and an added level of detail I like to make this textures cast shadows. Where said textures are twosided this isnt possible, but when said texture is on a model you can remove the twosided line and still see both sides of the texture. And because you have remove the twosided line that textures with then cast a shadow. I have attached a stock fern that I have tweaked to cast a shadow.

The issue I'm running into is I am trying to do the same thing on the palmtree leaf texture and for the life me I cant get the alphatest to work on the leaf texture. Its just casting a shadow of the whole patch, instead of the edges of the leaf...

So any idea's on what I'm doing incorrectly in this instance?

Dragofer's Scripting

Fri, 17 Jul 2020 15:58:51 +0000

As my custom assets work has increasingly shifted from models towards scripting, I'll open a new thread here to contain any scripts that I write which can be reused in other missions, starting with the

A ) Presence Lamp

This is a Lost City-style lamp that brightens and dims depending on the presence of the player or an AI. It fades between 2 colours and can trigger its targets whenever it switches fully on or off, so it should also be viable in various other situations.

The standard setup consists of the following:
- a trigger_multiple brush. The spawnarg "anyTouch" controls whether AIs, too, are able to activate it
- a presence lamp, highly recommended with a colorme skin
- one presence light, or any other light with appropriate spawnargs
The targeting chain is trigger brush -> lamp -> light

When the player or an AI stands in the trigger_multiple brush, the lamp switches on and starts a short timer. Subsequent triggers reset the timer. If the timer runs out because no one's standing in the trigger brush anymore, the lamp switches itself off.

Notes

- Multiple trigger brushes can target the same lamp, and one trigger brush can target multiple lamps. However, each presence lamp can only target one light, so if you want i.e. a bouncelight you'll need to hide an additional silent presence lamp somewhere and target it from the same trigger brush.

- The lamp and the light use their own colour spawnargs respectively, since setting 0 0 0 on a lamp would make it appear pitch black.

- Technically the trigger brush can be exchanged for anything else that triggers the lamp every 0.5s (this number can be changed via "update_interval" on the lamp), i.e. a trigger_timer.

- This was originally named the proximity lamp and was one of many scripting jobs for The Painter's Wife. I've renamed it to "presence lamp" because the mapper may place the trigger brush(es) wherever he wishes: proximity to the lamp is not a factor. Credits go to Bikerdude for putting together the crystal lamp models.

Download

Presence Lamps - Google Drive

Place or extract the .pk4 into your FM archive, then look up the presence lamp prefabs. If you already are using other custom scripts, remember to add the presence lamp's .script to your tdm_custom_scripts file.

B ) Teledoor

This is a Skyrim-style door which opens just a bit into a black_matt "void" before teleporting the player to a different area of the map, which may represent the other side of the door. This is used for connecting physically separated map areas with each other, such as when there's an exterior/interior split of a building or ship to allow for more mapping freedom.

[Full Thread]

C ) Mass Teleport

This is a teleportation setup designed to seamlessly teleport the player and any moveables between two identical-looking areas. This allows the mapper to link 2 physically distant areas with each other while maintaining the illusion that they're connected. The teleportation zones should be free of AIs as they can't be teleported like this without their patrols breaking.

[Post]

D ) Automaton Station

A station for Sotha's automatons (includes the automatons) which can be switched on and off by patrolling automatons. (Part of core assets as of 2.10)

[Post]

E ) Camgoyle

A sentient turret originally made for the FM Written in Stone. It's based on the new security camera entity and augmented with scripting to allow it to fire magical projectiles at the enemies it detects. People are more than welcome to use it and to convert it into something else, such as a mechanical turret.

[Post]

[Download]

F ) Audiograph

The audiograph is an Inventor's Guild device for playing back recordings stored on spindles, which are small metal cylinders the player can pick up and store in his inventory.

[Post]

G ) Turret

A new companion to security cameras familiar to Thief players. It will become active as soon as an enemy is detected by a targeted security camera, firing projectiles to fend off the intruders. Similar to the security camera and the camgoyle sentry, turrets are highly customisable in their behaviour and appearance.

[Thread]

G ) Fog Fade

Dynamically change fog density depending on what location the player is in.

[Thread]

Sounds aren't playing in-game: what am I missing?

Sat, 06 Jun 2026 10:38:14 +0000

Any idea why this isnt playing in-game? Its was 29mins ling Ive since cut that down to 3 minutes, but still dosen't play.

Question: HowTo change skybox based on location?

Fri, 05 Jun 2026 07:13:16 +0000

So I would like to use the call_on entry, call_on_exit method to change skyboxes. I have tried the following, but its causes a crash on map load -

I have 2x skybox entities 'portalsky_pagan' and 'portalsky_wastlands'

Dynamic ambient lighting

Sun, 10 May 2026 11:55:39 +0000

So in one of my maps I am "trying" play around with dynamic ambient light levels. The wiki article is missing some info and has some typo's but I cant get iot work like I have done in the past - https://wiki.thedarkmod.com/index.php?title=Dynamic_ambient_light#Dynamic_Ambient_Light_Spawnargs

Make levels using Blender?

Fri, 17 Feb 2023 11:57:18 +0000

Hi. I'm a long-time Blender user and was wondering if it's possible, in part or in whole, to use Blender to make levels, mostly the level geometry. I understand that NPC, scripting, partitioning, etc would be something better done in DarkRadiant, but I'd like to use Blender to make the buildings, streets, terrain, etc and to place them.

Split Pane

Sun, 03 May 2026 16:34:24 +0000

Whatever happened to the old split-pane view? The later versions of DR don't have it, or it's buried under a sub-heading.

Giving Mage Powers to Beastmen?

Wed, 15 Apr 2026 04:31:27 +0000

I wanted to create a "shaman" beastman AI with the same ranged fireball and melee spark attack as the "archmage" AI. Initially I tried just placing an archmage and swapping head/model/vocal set, but that resulted in a beastman with no melee attack chasing me around and doing nothing.

I'm assuming this is tied to animation problems... the beastman model has no animation for using mage attacks, and so no attacks happen. But I know nothing about the spawnargs, so I wonder if it's possible to create any arrangement of spawnargs allowing beastmen to cast fireballs etc as mages. Does anybody know if this is possible or not?

How about AI voice generation using the already existing voices?

Mon, 14 Oct 2024 19:56:06 +0000

I think it would be quite a handy tool to have an AI that can generate dialog in the voices that are already included, and even the various voice actors, if they are ok with that ...
and have it run local on your own computer.

Any thoughts on that?

Steps for importing an obj model into tdm without converting to ase/lwo

Wed, 01 Apr 2026 10:55:20 +0000

What are the steps for importing an obj model sucesfully into tdm, without converting it to ase or lwo? I tried it recently with a cat model, but it didn't show up well in tdm, while the lwo version did.

(If obj support doesn't work properly after all it should be investigated, fixed, or support should be removed)

Particle decal not showing in-game:

Sun, 05 Apr 2026 12:14:05 +0000

So any idea why I cant get these rising bubbles to show in-game..? its showing in DR just fine.

[2.14] New and updated assets

Sat, 24 Jan 2026 12:41:13 +0000

Miscellaneous asset fixes done:

* More fixes in fonts and better support for Cyrillic and Romanian (post, 6642, 6661).
* Added all missing mipmaps in DDS textures (post).
* Fixed shop description of slow match (6629).
* wood/panels/trim_wood_grunge_moulding_desat: fixed parallax confusion.
* models/md5/chars/builders/guard/builder_armor material: brought back specularmap.
* textures/darkmod/stone/brick/blocks_light_stained_trimmed material: fixed specularmap.
* prefabs/doors/trapdoor_w-padlock prefab: fixed wrong particle (6662).
* prefabs/mechanical/switches/wall_lever01 prefab: fixed frobbox of the lever (6060).
* models/darkmod/architecture/doors/door*hinge models: fixed gaps in almost all versions (6671) [02].
* models/darkmod/furniture/wardrobe_open model and prefab: fixed clipping through frame (6272) [02].
* models/md5/chars/heads/female03_head_local and dds/models/md5/chars/heads/face_freckle textures: replaced (5545) [03].
* models/darkmod/readables/book_* model: fixed UV maps in sp1 and red1 versions, texture fix (6672) [03].
* prefabs/doors/curvedtop_door_96x48_3hinge_w-frame prefab: fixed hinge material (3212) [03].
* models/darkmod/readables/book_tome model: minor fixes [03].
* models/darkmod/containers/bucket model: gap fixes (6675) [04].
* models/darkmod/containers/barrel_wine model: fixed shadowmesh (6685) [04].
*

New assets added:

* atdm:ai_undressed_old_man_01: added new character model, including LODs, ragdoll, swappable head.
* textures/darkmod/wood/panels/trim_wood_* material: added red variants.
* textures/darkmod/wood/panels/panel_decorative_redder_grated material.
* textures/darkmod/paint_paper/gold_pedals_* material: added RGB versions.
* textures/darkmod/paint_paper/fleur_* material: added RGB versions.
* textures/darkmod/stone/brick/red_worn_dirty_trim_wet material.
* textures/darkmod/stone/brick/old_bricks_darkgrey_wet material.
* models/darkmod/lights/non-extinguishable/painting_downlight model.
* models/darkmod/containers/openable/safe_door_003_* and safe_wheel_003: added wall-in-safe door model and prefabs (6590).

And there is a big set of assets added by @Wellingtoncrab and @Amadeus from the upcoming mission "Displacement".

New models by TDash:
* models/darkmod/furniture/beds/rustickingbed with skins DRustBed*
* models/darkmod/furniture/seating/darmch1 with skins ArmCh*
* models/darkmod/furniture/desk_pagan with skin JPagDesk2
* models/darkmod/furniture/steps_library with skin LibStepup1
* models/darkmod/mechanical/typewriter
* models/darkmod/kitchen/wine_bottles_shelved*: versions A, B, C, D
* models/darkmod/kitchen/whiskeyglass_silver
* models/darkmod/kitchen/bottle_simple_*
* models/darkmod/containers/crate_long_*
* models/darkmod/containers/crate_simple*
* trunk/models/darkmod/containers/wine_crate_03
* models/darkmod/furniture/cabinets/cupboard_*

More models:
* prefabs/mechanical/switches/red_button prefab along with models/darkmod/mechanical/switches/switch_redbutton* and switch_toggle* models and redbutton_glow* skins
* models/darkmod/decorative/statues/bust_emperor_* model (and bust_emperess)
* models/darkmod/kitchen/food/bread_loaf*: new versions 02, 03, 04, 05, 06
* models/darkmod/kitchen/food/croissant
* models/darkmod/lights/non-extinguishable/streetlamps/streetlamp_iron_01 with skins streetlamp_iron_01_lit, streetlamp_iron_01_unlit
* models/darkmod/decorative/trophy_plaque_*
* models/darkmod/decorative/stuffed_hart*
* models/darkmod/decorative/statues/statue_face_cover*
* models/darkmod/loot/loot_golden_goblet*
* models/darkmod/loot/loot_golden_vase_*
* models/darkmod/decorative/ashtray
* models/darkmod/decorative/cigar* with skins cigar and cigar_unlit
* models/darkmod/loot/loot_crystalore* (and loot_rareore)

New skins:
* cabinet1_* for furniture: versions A, B, C
* book_sp1_gold_crest for various books

Stone, cobblestone, brick materials:
* textures/darkmod/stone/brick/bricks_old_light*
* textures/darkmod/stone/brick/blocks_sandstone_grime_trimmed
* textures/darkmod/stone/brick/blocks_concrete_small_trimmed2
* textures/darkmod/stone/cobblestones/flagstones_bricks_multicolored*
* textures/darkmod/stone/flat/tile_dirty_terracotta
* textures/darkmod/stone/flat/tile_herringbone_grime*
* textures/darkmod/stone/flat/tile_checkered_grime_tricolor*
* textures/darkmod/stone/flat/tile_checkered_grime_small*
* textures/darkmod/stone/natural/gravel_multi_color

Other materials materials:
* textures/darkmod/paint_paper/wallpaper_grunge_*
* textures/darkmod/plaster/plaster_worn_painted_peeling_autumnal*
* textures/darkmod/roof/rooftiles_clay_red_decorative*
* textures/darkmod/wood/boards/planks_floor_*
* textures/darkmod/glass/glass_brick_clear [03]
* lights/watercaustics01

Note: [03] at the end of line means that this change appeared only in beta214-03.

How do I properly import an lwo model with skeleton and textures into darkradiant, so that it is the same as the existing AI?

Sun, 22 Mar 2026 22:00:16 +0000

How do I properly import an lwo model with skeleton and textures into darkradiant, so that it is the same as the existing AI?

What I mean is, I want the head and body separated, and the model I made to use the existing animations etc.

I've looked all over the wiki, and the darkradiatn and qeradiant user guides to see if I could find anything, but found nothing exactly as I needed.

When I try to just import the model (without bones), he's laying flat, face up, and the textures are all screwed up.

Here's an example of my model in lightwave:

[2.13] Mission overrides for cvars

Sat, 25 May 2024 09:52:34 +0000

There are two ways to override cvars in a mission:

mission.cfg file can set non-archived cvars (starting with 2.12).
sys.setcvar in game script can override cvars (starting with 2.13 / dev17044-10746).

Of course, there has never been any effort to classify cvars into public and private, no thinking of backwards compatibility of relying on cvars, etc. So overriding cvars should be considered a last resort feature.

mission.cfg allows to statically override cvars on FM level.
The change takes effect during all missions in a campaign and all briefings/debriefings/menus.
However, you cannot adjust cvar value during gameplay, so only one constant literal value can be set.

The implementation is simple:

mission.cfg file is executed from your mission when TDM engine starts
all non-archived cvars are reset to their defaults when TDM engine restarts (due to FM change)

sys.setcvar allows to override cvars on gameplay level.
These overrides behave like the variables in game scripts, i.e. they are saved/restored to savefile and reset on game start/end.
You can adjust the same cvar several times with different values, and savefile will capture the override that is currently active.
The minor downside is that these overrides automatically don't carry over between missions in campaign, and they cannot work in briefings/debriefings/menus.

Note that sys.setcvar has been available for a long time already, but previously it had different meaning.
Previously it set the cvar as if the player set it himself. So the values stuck between restarts, missions, FMs (even saved to darkmod.cfg for archived cvar). Now it always sets the "mission override" for cvar.

You can test cvar mission overrides manually using two new console commands:

setm {cvarname} {newvalue} --- set mission override for the cvar with given value
unsetm {cvarname} --- drop mission override for the cvar

It is not perfectly obvious what should happen if mission-overridden cvar is changed by user.
Right now the main value of cvar is changed and mission override is broken/erased in this case.
So be wary that user can mess with your overrides just like you can mess with his cvars.