Making Canyons using the Castle methodology

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Eleazar
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Making Canyons using the Castle methodology

Post by Eleazar »

I've been reading the tutorial here: http://www.wesnoth.org/wiki/CastleTutorial
The backgrounds are helpful, but...
Ayin talks about an "Exploder Tool" that apparently makes the work of castle-building much easier. Since there are a lot more castles in this game since last i checked, i can only assume people have been some sort of tool.
Where can i find this Exploder, or is there another way to automate castles?

Note: I don't actually want to make a castle, but use that method on other terrains.
Last edited by Eleazar on October 11th, 2005, 5:20 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by Woodwizzle »

Dunno if this helps, but if you download the source to wesnoth, there is an exploder subdirectory in the image directory and in the tools directory, so I'm guessing the source code for exploder is included with the source code of wesnoth.
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Eleazar
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Post by Eleazar »

i downloaded the source, and there are a bunch of exploder .cpp and .hpp files (.cpp=C++ ?) I suppose the user is supposed to comple these things, but that's beyond my skill. Has anybody compiled the Exploder and Cutter for Mac os X?
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Post by Darth Fool »

I suggest not using the exploder unless you are making very short towers. It makes hard cuts on the hex edges. In particular, for the ruin graphics where there were multiple versions of each towers, the exploder methodology causes graphical glithces. I think using wesnoth itself in windowed mode as the imploder is superior. My recommendations for how to make castles can be found at:

http://www.wesnoth.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2883

If you need any help, let me know.
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Eleazar
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Post by Eleazar »

I guess i should explain what i'm trying to do from the start (changed topic title to be more descriptive).

First i was contemplating the shortcommings of the Canyon. The current canyon really only work if you draw a single gently curving line. There are graphics for sharp turns and branches, but the .CFG doesn't know how to pick the right one. And there would need to be even more graphics to allow a canyon more than 1 hex wide. (Wide chasms or pits are used in some senarios in caves, but look terrible) There's no reason a single well thought-out terrain can't fill both roles. Then i noticed that the castle tile can take any random shape and correctly line the edges of the shape with transitions--Just what i want the canyon to do.

I don't know if i can modify a castle set to make this work...

D. Fool, by "using Wesnoth itself... as an Imploder" you mean as a means to see if the pieces fit together properly? If so i'm already using wesnoth or the map editor for that part.
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Post by Darth Fool »

Eleazar wrote: I don't know if i can modify a castle set to make this work...

D. Fool, by "using Wesnoth itself... as an Imploder" you mean as a means to see if the pieces fit together properly? If so i'm already using wesnoth or the map editor for that part.
Yes that is what I meant. In particular the use of ":refresh" is very handy. The problem I had with the exploder was that it would lop off some of the tops of towers that were extending into the predefined adjacent wall images. This worked fine for the standard castle where there was only one set of images, but it failed miserably for the ruined graphics since I had multiple versions of the same tower. This resulted in pieces of tower tops that occaisionally floated above the ruined base! The point here is that the exploder can get you started, but it is likely to take functionally seperate pieces of your graphics and mix them. This then requires editing the individual graphics by hand. I did this to the old castle graphics so that they would be consistent with the ruins. The time it takes to do this significantly decreases the benefit of using the exploder in the first place.

I would offer to make a set of placeholder graphics and .cfg file for doing a canyon type transition which you could then use as templates to improve on, but my laptop (on which all my wesnothing is done) is currently undergoing repairs. I think it is possible to do what you want to do with the current WML. If you find reverse-engineering the terrain-graphics.cfg to get it to do what you want it to do, I ought to be able to help in a few days time. On the other hand, it sounds like you may not need any help, in which case, great, I can't wait to see the new canyon walls!
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Post by Eleazar »

Oddly enough i also am about to send my precious laptop off for repairs.
Thanks, for the advice. I should have it back again in about a week.
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Post by Darth Fool »

Ok, I got my laptop back, at least for the weekend. Here is a really bad rendition of the canyons using the castle methodology. To use this use will need to add the following to the end of data/terrain.cfg:

Code: Select all

[terrain]
symbol_image=canyon
id=canyon-wall
name= _ "Canyon"
char=x
aliasof=X
[/terrain]
and what is below into terrain-graphics.cfg above the loyalist castle line (I have included it at the end for reference.)

Code: Select all

# canyon "castle"
{DISABLE_TRANSITIONS x}
{TERRAIN_BASE x dirt}
{TERRAIN_ADJACENT_CORNER_PROB      x      !x    !x   52,76 canyon-2-convex 50}
{TERRAIN_ADJACENT_CORNER_PROB      x      !x    !x   52,76 canyon-convex 100}
{TERRAIN_ADJACENT_CORNER_PROB      !x     x     x    56,68 canyon-2-concave 50}
{TERRAIN_ADJACENT_CORNER_PROB      !x     x     x    56,68 canyon-concave 100}

# Loyalist castle
I have included two versions of the canyons (one with a red x) so that you can see how to do random variations. Note that if you add a third variation, it should have a probability of 33 and be placed before the line with 50.

Special transitions will probably be needed for water and maybe others. I can help wth the WML if you need it.

here is how it looks in game. It is really bad because I did nothing but a very rough cut and paste with no aligning or anything, but it should be good enough to get you started. The key to doing these is to pick a line at which the different graphics should match and crop at that line. Then edit the graphics and use ":refresh" alot. Perhaps a better set of graphics for starting would be to replace the images with a small grid and make sure you get the alignment right. I will leave it in your capable hands.
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Eleazar
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Post by Eleazar »

OK, the castle style canyon should draw below the cave wall transitions.
Currently it does only some of the time. (upper left is an example of the canyon being drawn over the wall. I can't figure out how to change that.

The other glitches in my example i think i know how to fix.
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Post by Elvish_Pillager »

Cool lookin'!
It's all fun and games until someone loses a lawsuit. Oh, and by the way, sending me private messages won't work. :/ If you must contact me, there's an e-mail address listed on the website in my profile.
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Post by Neoriceisgood »

Eleazar, I want to have your babies.
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Post by freim »

Yeah, this looks like it will turn out quite cool. Good work
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Eleazar
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Post by Eleazar »

Neoriceisgood wrote:Eleazar, I want to have your babies.
These kind of "complements" scare me.
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Post by torangan »

Let's assume babies refers to your graphics? :D
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Post by Jetrel »

Me too. (note the deliberate ambiguity)
Eleazar wrote:
Neoriceisgood wrote:Eleazar, I want to have your babies.
These kind of "complements" scare me.
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