UDMF mapping in Slade 3 vs UDB?

There's no contest that UDB is a lot more featureful and polished than SLADE in the editor department. Mostly because it is also a lot more actively developed. SLADE's main advantage is that it's part of a complete resource editor, so if you've opened something to check out its content, then it's faster to use its map editor to look at a map. But for actual development, UDB will be better.

Note that SLADE does allow you to open a map in Doom Builder. Just point the proper setting to the Builder.exe you want to use, and then you can right-click on a map header and see "Open in Doom Builder" at the bottom of the context menu.

It depends on what you want to do but I'd definitely recommend UDB over Slade any day. Rotateable grid, slope handles, arch tools, model exporter, etc. If you're more content with basic UDMF then stick with Slade but if you want more I'd go with UDB.

I’ve been told my multiple people that UDB works in wine, I don’t use linux so Idk how to set that up but I’m sure someone does. 
 

UDB has a lot of q.o.l. Improvements that make it a go to if you aren’t already used to DB2 and much better than slade From what I have heard but I haven’t done any mapping in slade. 

It's very reasonable that you don't like mapping UDMF with SLADE, neither do I. It's even missing a shitload of options! Luckily, UDB is designed to kinda work with WINE last I heard, but I've also heard that it's kinda a nightmare. Also do know that you won't be able to use your Linux binaries with UDB in WINE for obvious reasons. If you can't get it to work, I'd recommend you install a Windows partition and use UDB there.

On 12/23/2021 at 10:51 AM, HrnekBezucha said:

So I gotta move onto some other editor for stuff like slopes and interactive portals etc.

I use Eureka mostly, and slopes and interactive portals can both be easily done (in DiHF). You just need to assign the right line specials. From comments I see here and elsewhere, UDMF is a lot more flexible, but I have never felt overly restricted by using Hexen format as that format plus ACS will allow me to do all kinds of funky stuff.

Slade3 will run natively on Linux, and it does allow UDMF maps. But, Ugh!

Also, see this: https://github.com/ioan-chera/eureka-editor/issues/1

UDMF is coming to Eureka!

1 minute ago, smeghammer said:

 

I use Eureka mostly, and slopes and interactive portals can both be easily done (in DiHF). You just need to assign the right line specials. From comments I see here and elsewhere, UDMF is a lot more flexible, but I have never felt overly restricted by using Hexen format as that format plus ACS will allow me to do all kinds of funky stuff.

 

Slade3 will run natively on Linux, and it does allow UDMF maps. But, Ugh!

 

Also, see this: https://github.com/ioan-chera/eureka-editor/issues/1

 

UDMF is coming to Eureka!

Yep, the winter UDMF is comming. There is a mac build floating about here somewhere with partial UDMF support. But I honestly don't really know what's the main difference. So far, Hexen format seems perfectly adequate. Btw, you got a hexen format map you're particularly proud of?

9 minutes ago, HrnekBezucha said:

Btw, you got a hexen format map you're particularly proud of?

You asked for it, dude! 

I have several, yes:

https://www.doomworld.com/idgames//index.php?search=1&field=author&word=Smeghammer&sort=time&order=asc&page=1

They are all quite different, and quite experimental (been mapping basically since COVID hit) but are all DiHF, with extensive use of ACS and some weirdness... Probably most proud of 'Corporate Nightmare' though. One of them is a Heretic map.

I'd love to know what you think of them.

On 12/31/2021 at 9:47 PM, HrnekBezucha said:

But I honestly don't really know what's the main difference. So far, Hexen format seems perfectly adequate.

UDMF is basically Hexen format but better. To be honest I've rarely used Hexen format (it's generally felt there's no point to using Hexen format when every source port that supports Hexen also supports UDMF, and UDMF does everything Hexen does) so I'm certainly no expert, but some of the main differences I am aware of are:

• Assign tags to lines directly (not just as activators for sectors), so actions and scripts can now target lindefs without the need for ACS workarounds
• Hexen format only allows 256 tags, UDMF has effectively unlimited tags
• UDMF is fully text based, meaning you can add any number of additional parameters to any aspect of the map with no compatibility issues. 
• Most values are floating point, so you can (for example) position something at sub map unit positions. This allows for things like an effective rotational grid in UDB.
• Expanded list of default flags, settings and activation flags for basically everything. And new ones can be added easily - e.g. recently "Block walking enemies" was added for Linedefs
• You can write comments in your sectors that only show up in the editor!
• And all the above are handled independently - so thankfully no more things like the upper sidedef offset impacting the lower sidedef offset, or what a switch does being linked to how it's activated.

Basically there's no real reason to stick to Hexen format when starting a new map, unless you are creating a map for vanilla Hexen of course. If you're targeting a Doom source port that supports Hexen format, UDMF is probably the better choice, and arguably the only reliable solution long term.

As someone who used DiH for years before UDMF came around, UDMF is worlds better than DiH. The only reason to use DiH is if you're mapping for a port that doesn't support UDMF like ZDaemon.

2 hours ago, Bauul said:

• Hexen format only allows 256 tags, UDMF has effectively unlimited tags 

To be precise, Hexen format actually supports up to 65536 sector tags (from 0 to 65535), but the linedef special arguments only go from 0 to 255. So if a tag above 255 needs to be affected by a switch for example, an ACS script or some other indirect method needs to be used to refer to tags above 255.
 

2 hours ago, Bauul said:

it's generally felt there's no point to using Hexen format when every source port that supports Hexen also supports UDMF

Though if you are mapping for multiplayer ports, it's worth noting that Hexen format is compatible with Odamex and ZDaemon, while UDMF is not.