DromED from DarkRadiant?

[Goldwell]

I have been tossing around the idea of doing a Thief 2 FM after I finish my current TDM mission and I was wondering if anyone who has had experience with DromED and DarkRadiant can comment on the difference between the two with their personal experiences.

 

I understand obviously that there is a big leap with the graphics and physics and similar things but is it a tough engine to work with? Because I have some experience with DR would that help out using DromED at all?

[New Horizon]

Dark Radiant is an additive editor (you build your world with brushes) whereas Dromed is subtractive(the entire world is solid and you carve empty spaces out of it), that may take some getting used to. Experience building an FM is generally going to help, but I think they're both pretty different editors.

[Sir Taffsalot]

In my very humble opinion, if you would really like to make a name as an FM author in the Thief community, then it would serve you best to make at least 2 or 3 FMs in DR before you decide to switch to another platform. If your second FM is in DromEd then I fear there will be little to no improvement from the first one because most of the skills you have learned in DR will be obsolete. Also the release time between FMs will be greatly increased due to having to learn how to use a different level editor all over again. Large periods of time without finishing anything can be very de-motivating.

 

Personally I have never opened DromEd so don't take this as gospel, but from what I've read in various posts while I've been hanging around the TDM and TTLG forums over the years is that DromEd and DR are very different with DR been much more user friendly. I would keep working on the three FMs you have listed in your sig. I'm sure that once your first one is complete, your other two will be much more easy. If things get too much then take a break and do something else for a while. Something that's non Thief FM related.

 

That's just my humble opinion. At the end of the day though, you've got to do what you think makes you happy.

[Melan]

Dromed is quirky and does some things counter-intuitively, but it is not that hard to use. Subtractive editing is not a problem since you can just carve out a big empty space and then just build there. (Actually, it is best to combine the two approaches - subtract is pretty powerful, a bit like DR's clipper.) The workflow can be slower than in DR.

[Goldwell]

In my very humble opinion, if you would really like to make a name as an FM author in the Thief community, then it would serve you best to make at least 2 or 3 FMs in DR before you decide to switch to another platform. If your second FM is in DromEd then I fear there will be little to no improvement from the first one because most of the skills you have learned in DR will be obsolete. Also the release time between FMs will be greatly increased due to having to learn how to use a different level editor all over again. Large periods of time without finishing anything can be very de-motivating.

 

Personally I have never opened DromEd so don't take this as gospel, but from what I've read in various posts while I've been hanging around the TDM and TTLG forums over the years is that DromEd and DR are very different with DR been much more user friendly. I would keep working on the three FMs you have listed in your sig. I'm sure that once your first one is complete, your other two will be much more easy. If things get too much then take a break and do something else for a while. Something that's non Thief FM related.

 

That's just my humble opinion. At the end of the day though, you've got to do what you think makes you happy.

 

You know I didn't really consider that, because when I started building my FM months ago it took me forever to complete a room yet now it goes by really quickly because I am getting used to where textures are in the editor and shortcuts and just how to build things properly so yeah if I started learning something else that would either pause that or sort of undo it because I need to learn a whole new way of things.

 

I think you have a good point there!

 

@Melan: I have never used a subtractive editor before.. I watched a few tutorial videos about DromED last night and it does seem pretty interesting. But yeah I guess I will leave it on the back burner for now.