IETME Woe

[Guest The_Swordalizer]

I've been messing around with IETME since downloading it last week, but I keep hitting problems with reusing existing areas. I load an existing area, save it under a new area name (creating all files associated with it), go into NI and alter the .ARE and .WED to point to the correct .WED and .TIS files. This works fine.

 

However, when I try to delete the existing doors or actors i get a crash to desktop when entering the area. I don't want to have to create a whole new search map, light map, walls etc. for simple area's that already have a map in the game (like a prison or a house). Is IETME not updating the .WED file correctly? I looked in NI but all the offsets seem to be correct...

 

Help!

[SimDing0]

No idea, I'm afraid, but you should really shelve IETME and use DLTCEP for area editing.

[Guest The_Swordalizer]

I can't seem to find many tutorials for DLTCEP, whilst IETME came with a comprehensive tutorial covering detailed map creation...

 

DLTCEP looks powerful but fairly incomprehensible on the initial sweep. Looks like it will need a fairly serious time investment to get comfortable with it.

 

Anyone have links to tutorials?

[igi]

Theres a tutorial on setting up DLTCEP here:

http://www.mcwrench.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=90

 

Theres an incomplete interface guide here:

http://www.mcwrench.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=106

 

There's a guide to making areas with DLTCEP included with DLTCEP itself.

[Rabain]

When you open an area in IETME you should be able to simply change the wed under the Area Properties button. When you save the area under a different area name a new wed and tis is created based on the names you have provided in Area Properties and at the time of saving.

 

There should be no need to rename anything in NI. It has always worked fine for me. I find IETME much more user friendly than DLTCEP though it does crash a lot an inopportune times as opposed to DLTCEP which hasn't crashed once to date!

[Avenger]

There are lots of area building tutorials using DLTCEP on spellholdstudios.net!

They come with screenshots and they are quite comprehensive.

[Guest The_Swordalizer]

I'll have a look there then. I found the reason for my crashes - I had a corrupt version of the area I was exporting in my override folder. deleted it and it works fine. I seem to have a lot of .are files in my override folder. Does opening a file in IETME export it to override?

[Rabain]

I believe the default folder for IETME to extract to is in the IETME installation folder itself (called extracted areas). I often find (when running out of disk space) that this folder can take up quite a lot of space.

 

The default folder for DLTCEP is the override iirc. It is annoying sometimes that when saving files in DLTCEP it doesn't remember the last folder you had open but instead offers you the override each time!

 

It's a small thing anyway...

[Smoketest]

Thanks for the reminder about -Y-'s tutorials. He's added a few new ones since the last time I visited FW (last year). If I can get my edit of Jon's Dungeon level 1 working this time around, I may keep DLTCEP around for future area editing.

 

(IETME is still handy what with it's ability to display doors, entrances, containers, etc. I use it sometimes to find out where things are on the map.)

[Guest The_Swordalizer]

IETME seems to have a much more user friendly front end - actually working on the map as it appears in the game makes it easier to see how the finished item will look.

 

@ Rabain - I was forgetting about setting the WED file. Thanks for that!

 

When it comes to area creation I've heard a bit about a program called Bryce - a 3D modelling editor? Is this kind of like what Black Isle used to create the original maps? I've noticed several of the areas have the same structures reused but rotated so I figured they had to be done in a 3D editor.

[Vlad]

Well, I actually do not wish to interfere here, but... DLTCEP area modding capabilities are potentially far superior over IETME, however and unfortunately - only potentially. IETME still offers nice graphic editting features such as making walls, search and height maps with several mouse clicks or making/locating traps, containers, ambients etc visually. The best way to make areas is combine both programs + Photoshop. Bryce is great! I have recently purchased the new version 5.5 from DAZ, the rendering times really twice faster than of the previous DAZ 5.01 version. I also use Vue 4, and this is another very good 3D landscaping program. Photoshop is very handy for making BMPs of the area you are working on, then normally you should load this BMP into IETME and make all other work on it until you get your TIS file. Unfortunately IETME has a bug in saving and re-saving WED files particularly with doors and animated overlays. Here comes DLTCEP which allows you to extract smoothly already made areas from BIF, and then correctly re-save them after you finish your modifications in Photoshop and/or IETME. All in all, it's a long story, and there are very good tutorials around on making areas, particularly look for those of Cuv. I have planned to write my own tutorial but it takes a lot of time from actual modding, anyway I'm still planning to do this.

[Avenger]

I believe you can make 'from the scratch' walls the same easily in DLTCEP as in IETME. But in DLTCEP you can also remove/add a single vertex (while seeing it graphically). Or move the polygon. Or reverse/shift its vertices (which may be required for correct wall polygons).

I made those features while working on DLTC's walls, and believe me, I wrote it because IETME made me very very angry.

The only thing where IETME is better is that it can simultaneously display different things (like containers+traps) and any combo.

DLTCEP can display only all of a single type (like all walls OR all containers, etc).

I believe that my aux (search/height/light) map editor is superior to the one in IETME, and the same goes for the overlay editor.

[Guest The_Swordalizer]

@ Vlad - Bug? Any details? I keep having area's corrupt in IETME after working on them.

 

@ Avenger: You wrote DLTCEP, Wow. I'm kind of scared by it at the mo - though I'm starting to use it in conjunction with IETME due to the problem listed above. Creating new areas that gel with the existing ones is IMHO the best way to make your mod stand out, so I'm keen to learn.

 

P.S. - any news on DLTC?

[Cuv]

@ Vlad - Bug?    Any details? I keep having area's corrupt in IETME after working on them.

 

It seems that IETME will sometimes corrupt an area upon saving if you have messed with doors or wall polygons. The workaround for this is tedious---> Build a basic area without any doors or wall polygons and keep it safe, then add doors one or two at a time. Save and check for corruption, if clean, then it becomes your new backup to add upon. Do your wall polygons last:) They seem most prone to wed corruption in IETME, following the same steps as above. If you are working from an existing area... things get tougher. Try not to pull all of your hair out or smash too many irreplaceable personal belongings... and just keep trying.

 

Removing doors can be a real headache with IETME... but it is doable. But I have found that the maximum amount of doors that you can cleanly remove is 5 or 6. After that you get graphical errors elsewhere in the tileset. I ran into this problem while rebuilding the main dungeon of Windspear for RTW. There are over 40 doors... and I needed to remove 20 of them to show the new layout. So I had to hide the graphical errors in the tiles by changing more things than was my original intention.

 

I know nothing about DLTCEP... I haven't had any time to learn it.

 

Cuv

[SimDing0]

Learning it would be a valuable investment, I suspect. IETME wallgrouping is a horrible, horrible joke in comparison.