Adding new flats makes my wad unplayable in Doom 2?

[Kaede]

Hi there, I want to add some new flats to my Doom2 level but every time I try and do this it makes the wad incompatible with Doom2. I am trying to add the flats using the XWE program. Any idea what my cause this?

Also, the patches I have added all appear with purple lines and garbled graphics. Everything displays fine when run in Zdoom though.

Cheers

[Quasar]

These are old limitations and bugs you're running into here. Sadly, editing for source ports has become so common now that information on how to avoid and work around these old problems is disappearing.

The first problem is the flats-in-pwads problem. Because Vanilla Doom requires the flats to be in one linear block in the wad directory, adding new ones messes it up. There is a workaround for this involving use of FF_START (or is it FF_END?) IIRC. Some older tools may be able to adjust your wad to get this to work without use of Deutex.

The second problem sounds like Tutti Fruiti to me. The old Vanilla engine only tiles textures at 128-unit boundaries, and so if you try to tile shorter textures, the space between the end of the texture and the next place it tiles will be filled with garbage read from uninitialized memory. This, for some reason, usually shows up as a peppering of pastel colors, hence the "tutti fruiti" name that was given to it. The only way to avoid this is to only tile textures of the appropriate size (if dealing with your own textures, you can edit them to be 128 units tall by manually repeating the patches in the texture several times.

[myk]

Use the FF_START and F_END marker combination to include flats in a Doom compatible wad.

[Kaede]

Hi Guys, many thanks for the replies. I'll give it another shot in case I'm missing something but I'm using the FF_START and FF_END markers already, making sure to put the flats in between them. :(

I really wanted the wad I am working on to be compatible with Doom 2 but perhaps I will have to give up on this as using the older editing programs is a non-starter for me!

Everything looks fine in Zdoom however so I'll stick to making it compatible in that.

Thanks very much

Kaede

[Manc]

There's nothing wrong with trying to strive for better compatibility! Too often the "works in zdoom" approach can become a disadvantage. It's worth learning some of these older techniques to both broaden your horizons on where doom editing has come from and increasing compatibility. Unless you're using zdoom-specific features, don't make it zdoom-only!

[Kaede]

Ok, I persevered with this and I noticed two things I did wrong.

1.I used FF_END instead of F_END.

2.The order the 'lumps' (Sectors, Linedefs,Patches etc.) is very important? If you put things in the wrong order it mucks up the wad?

Anyway I seem to be getting somewhere now, thanks for the help! Are there any other factors I should be aware of before messing up my wad even further?

Cheers!

Kaede

[ReX]

Kaede said:

Are there any other factors I should be aware of before messing up my wad even further?

Going back to your original problem with new flats being incompatible with doom2.exe, one way to handle it is to replace existing flats with your new flats. In other words, simply replace the graphic but keep the original name. The disadvantage is that you then won't have the original flats available. [This disadvantage, however, is diminished if you choose the flats to be replaced carefully. For example, if your map is to have a tech-base theme you can generally dispense with the hell-themed flats such as the 6 flats in the DEM1 series, the BLOOD series, etc.] Another disadvantage may crop up if you have more flats to insert than those you want to replace.

[Kaede]

Cool, and I can do that just by naming the flats with the exact same name as they have in Doom2 right? And I guess this applies to patches as well? I'll have a play around and see what happens! ;)

Another question (sorry) I noticed if I delete a texture I selected on accident in XWE, it corrupts the wad. How can I fix it so if I remove a texture the wad still works properly?

Thanks again

[ReX]

Kaede said:

Cool, and I can do that just by naming the flats with the exact same name as they have in Doom2 right? And I guess this applies to patches as well?

Yes to both questions. With patches, keep in mind that if you use an existing name for a new patch graphic you should make sure of a couple of things. First, it's preferable to replace an existing patch with another of the same size. Otherwise the textures in which the patch appears will likely get screwed up. Second, if a texture in which your new patch appears also contains other patches, then the texture will look messed up (unless you've replaced the other patches too).

I noticed if I delete a texture I selected on accident in XWE, it corrupts the wad. How can I fix it so if I remove a texture the wad still works properly?

Are you talking about deleting a texture entry in the TEXTURE1 lump? As far as I know this should not mess anything up. However, if you delete a patch (i.e., the graphic itself) without deleting the corresponding textures there may be some problems. In XWE if you do anything by accident use the Undo feature to reverse your mistake. If that does not work, revert to a back-up version of your wad.

[myk]

ReX said:
Going back to your original problem with new flats being incompatible with doom2.exe, one way to handle it is to replace existing flats with your new flats.

It's a lame way to do it, though. Maybe for patches if one doesn't want to risk messing with TEXTURE1 yet, or when using a crappy old map editor that can't read PWAD resources.

In any case, it's always better to be able to add without having to sacrifice anything.