Flats only for floor/ceiling textures?

[Maidoomku]

New here and new to mapping and it looks a ton of fun, I'm starting off using GZDoom builder in the Boom format, only problem so far is as mentioned all other textures don't appear for the floor and ceiling except flats unlike other formats I tried. Any solutions? 

[Gez]

There's no solution. It's how it's supposed to be.

 

Okay so quick writeup on the why: the Doom rendering engine, to speed things up, draws walls by columns, and floors or ceilings by lines. Why? Distance. Given how the viewpoint is always horizontal, all the pixels on a column of a wall are at the same distance, and therefore the same scale, as are all the pixels on a line of a floor or ceiling. So it's an optimization trick.

 

Since wall textures and flat textures are drawn differently, and still to keep things optimized, the pixel data is also stored differently. In a wall texture, pixels are stored vertically (if you move to the next byte, it describes the pixel below the current one) while in a flat texture they are stored horizontally (the next byte is the pixel to the right).

 

And so since we have different image formats that are drawn in different ways, they are not compatible. With vanilla, Boom, and most ports that didn't change how the renderer works, you cannot mix flats and wall textures because the engine doesn't accept it, and even if it did accept it, then it would glitch and crash.

 

Flat/texture mixing is reserved to ports that have overhauled the texture manager and/or rendering engine, so you can do it in the configs for some advanced ports like GZDoom, Eternity, EDGE, etc. but not with vanilla/Boom/MBF/Choco/etc.

[Maidoomku]

22 minutes ago, Gez said:

There's no solution. It's how it's supposed to be.

 

Okay so quick writeup on the why: the Doom rendering engine, to speed things up, draws walls by columns, and floors or ceilings by lines. Why? Distance. Given how the viewpoint is always horizontal, all the pixels on a column of a wall are at the same distance, and therefore the same scale, as are all the pixels on a line of a floor or ceiling. So it's an optimization trick.

 

Since wall textures and flat textures are drawn differently, and still to keep things optimized, the pixel data is also stored differently. In a wall texture, pixels are stored vertically (if you move to the next byte, it describes the pixel below the current one) while in a flat texture they are stored horizontally (the next byte is the pixel to the right).

 

And so since we have different image formats that are drawn in different ways, they are not compatible. With vanilla, Boom, and most ports that didn't change how the renderer works, you cannot mix flats and wall textures because the engine doesn't accept it, and even if it did accept it, then it would glitch and crash.

 

Flat/texture mixing is reserved to ports that have overhauled the texture manager and/or rendering engine, so you can do it in the configs for some advanced ports like GZDoom, Eternity, EDGE, etc. but not with vanilla/Boom/MBF/Choco/etc.

That's a bummer, but thanks for the answer.

 

Would it be best to stick with Boom and download flats (and if there are ways of getting simpler wall textures as flats) or to switch to a different format? 

[Bauul]

17 minutes ago, Maidoomku said:

That's a bummer, but thanks for the answer.

 

Would it be best to stick with Boom and download flats (and if there are ways of getting simpler wall textures as flats) or to switch to a different format? 

 

That depends entirely on what you're trying to make!

 

If you're prioritizing near universal compatibility and classic Doom functionality, Boom format is a good place to be.

 

If you're prioritizing advanced features and scale at the expense of wider compatibility, UDMF through GZDoom or Eternity or equivalent is a better option. 

 

Every source port and map format has its pros and cons. What is right for you depends entirely on what you're trying to make.

[Maidoomku]

4 minutes ago, Bauul said:

 

That depends entirely on what you're trying to make!

 

If you're prioritizing near universal compatibility and classic Doom functionality, Boom format is a good place to be.

 

If you're prioritizing advanced features and scale at the expense of wider compatibility, UDMF through GZDoom or Eternity or equivalent is a better option. 

 

Every source port and map format has its pros and cons. What is right for you depends entirely on what you're trying to make.

I had thought about making most in Boom and then switching to UDMF after getting some experience, but using them base on the map is much smarter.

Thanks for the advice! I'll try tinkering with a map later.

[Doomkid]

Just so you know, you could easily export all the flats from doom2.wad as PNGs or Bitmaps using SLADE, rename them (since 2 lumps should not share a name) and reimport them as patches, then add all the new patches to the TEXTURE1 lump. It sounds hard but it’s actually super easy. If you need to use flats on the wall in Boom (or vanilla) this is the way to do it.

[Maidoomku]

I appreciate the method, but there aren't many flats I might need on a wall... There's a ton of wall textures I would need on a floor or ceiling, only drawback for Boom so far.

 

Edit: Thanks boris I'll keep that in mind

Edited September 4, 2019 by Maidoomku

[boris]

3 hours ago, Maidoomku said:

I appreciate the method, but there aren't many flats I might need on a wall... There's a ton of wall textures I would need on a floor or ceiling, only drawback for Boom so far.

 

Note that engines without the advanced texture handling are only able to use 64x64 flats. If you want to use bigger flats you have to split them into 64x64 ones. A good example are the DEM1_1 to DEM1_4 flats.

[Kappes Buur]

9 hours ago, Maidoomku said:

New here and new to mapping and it looks a ton of fun, I'm starting off using GZDoom builder in the Boom format, only problem so far is as mentioned all other textures don't appear for the floor and ceiling except flats unlike other formats I tried. Any solutions? 

 

This is a typical example of jumping into DOOM mapping without doing the proper research, when there are countless tutorials available to ease into mapping. But as I always suspect, learning the basics seems to be a lost art. 

 

https://www.doomworld.com/forum/53-editing-tutorials/

https://www.doomworld.com/tutorials/intro.php

https://www.doomworld.com/idgames/docs/

https://forum.zdoom.org/viewforum.php?f=39&sid=931e71387cad39fc808c1f2c064cf504

https://zdoom.org/wiki/Tutorials

Many videos on Youtube.

 

8 hours ago, Maidoomku said:

Would it be best to stick with Boom and download flats (and if there are ways of getting simpler wall textures as flats) or to switch to a different format? 

 

That is a question only you can answers after you have done some research. 

There is nothing standing in your way to make your own textures/flats.

 

Two questions for you to ponder:

Why do you want to limit yourself to an old mapping format which has so many restrictions?

Why do you map, for your own enjoyment or for future possible accolades bestowed by others?

 

There are some decent mapping efforts for DOOM/BOOM, using vanilla construction but take full advantage of new textures/flats, for example: Ancient Aliens and Back to Saturn X. Maybe you can learn from them.

 

In general, mapping for DOOM/BOOM with the default resources of DOOM.WAD or DOOM2.WAD is so old hat. Over the years thousands of such maps have been made. Sure, someone playing your map will probably comment how the gameplay reminded them of the old DOOM and how they enjoyed it, but in the end they play the map maybe a dozen times and then turn to something new.

 

Making your map stand out from the rest, as anything in life, takes dedication, imagination and perseverance.

 

But I am rambling.

I look forward to your first map. 

 

 

Edited September 4, 2019 by Kappes Buur

[Graf Zahl]

1 hour ago, Kappes Buur said:

In general, mapping for DOOM/BOOM with the default resources of DOOM.WAD or DOOM2.WAD is so old hat. Over the years thousands of such maps have been made.

 

 

But you know what? Many people do not want change, they want more of the same all the time. Just have a look at how dull mainstream music and movies have become. It's very much the same with Doom maps - many of the users mainly want to experience the same gameplay in different settings - but not too different. Otherwise all those different classic ports would not even exist.

 

[Maidoomku]

12 hours ago, Kappes Buur said:

But I am rambling.

I look forward to your first map. 

Well I completely got what you were saying, no doubt in my mind there are a lot of expectations for maps of a 25+ year old game with many not being the "most" creative, and I should have watched more tutorials first my bad on that, I'll check the links and few others to help wrap my head around mapping.

 

Anyway, this is something I've always wanted to do so I'm happy starting with Doom.

I can't guarantee any maps I make will be any good but I'll try and make most different in my own way, especially ones I post.

 

Also happy to join the community dudes, appreciate all advice (should have included that in my original post)