Question...

[Kid Airbag]

Okay, let's say you've played Doom for seven years and you now want to start building levels. What would be the best downloadable level editor?

[Sharessa]

Heh...I've been asking myself that for years...

[Zaldron]

Good question. I'd say WadAuthor is good to start, kinda like the WorldCraft of Doom engined games.

[Kid Airbag]

Thanks, Zaldron. I was sketching maps like I do sometimes when I'm bored and I realized I had come up with one that would be simple enough to make a stab at actually making. No amazing special effects, etc. Where would I be able to get WadAuthor?

[Zaldron]

How about the Utilities section on DW?

[Kid Airbag]

Eh, it can't seem to find the file for some reason. Google, here I come.

[Liam]

Wadauthor is definetely the easiest.

You can give DeepSea a whirl-I did recently and I enjoy it-but the 10000 editing features that jump at you when you boot it up are intimidating for editing newbs.

[Zaldron]

Bear in mind I learned with DCK, wich looks and behaves pretty much like WA. The only major difference is in the sector building tools, they're kinda like a pain in the ass but you're not forced to learn dozens of stupid key combinations, the definitive turn-off for most beginners.

Just take a look at BUILD, the fucking entire keyboard is mapped. No tools show up at the 2D mode.

[Kid Airbag]

Well, the most complicated thing in the level is probably gonna be invisible walls, you know, to make monsters appear to be in "stasis". Other than that, there's probably gonna be lots of switches, lifts, and tripwires.

[Zaldron]

Yeah that's pretty easy to do, not to say intuitive. I'll say the biggest problem with Doom editors is their complete inhability to properly cut/paste over existing geometry and the lame support for the creation of new sectors derived from the intersection of 2 or more existing sectors.

[Kid Airbag]

Hmm, I can't seem to figure out what any of this shit means. Heh, I'm helpless.

[AngelOfDeath]

Waded is pretty good easy too

[Zaldron]

Hmm, I can't seem to figure out what any of this shit means. Heh, I'm helpless.

Yeah that was pretty much my intention. But still I'm serious :)

[pritch]

I messed around with WinDEU when I started. It was simple enough to understand basic principles of vertices, linedefs, and sectors, but I found it was buggy as hell, the nodes builder was unreliable, and I couldn't for the life of me figure out how to make a door. I knew it had to be a sector between two other sectors, you know- that a door is itself a sector, but their explanation of how to do it was completely inadequate. So all of my WinDEU maps have teleporters and no doors!

I think once you've built a good door, the right size, which is properly tagged so it doesn't 'climb' up the wall, and has DOORTRAK as its sidedef on the inside, and that also doesn't 'climb' up the wall, well then I think you've made a big leap.

Sorry, only a small number of people will have a clue what I'm talkking about here, I think.

[Enjay]

I think once you've built a good door, the right size, which is properly tagged so it doesn't 'climb' up the wall, and has DOORTRAK as its sidedef on the inside, and that also doesn't 'climb' up the wall, well then I think you've made a big leap.

Yes, that is one of the "breakthrough" points I remember too. I got doors to work before teleporters though. Rather biazrrely the first moving sector effect I did was the fairly complex one of a rising staircase. I didn't know why it worked, and it took me years to actually sort out what the rules were for them. That staircase is still in my NJZdoom (level 20). Originally released as a single level on compuserve imaginatively called "MYFIRST.WAD"

Doors nowadays are easy. Select the sector that will be a door and use the DeePsea "make door from sector option". It sets the ceiling height, applies the appropriate lindef types, reversing the lines if need be, puts "DOORTRAK" on the sides, sets the lower unpeg flag and puts BIGDOOR2 on the upper sides.

Mappers these days don't know they're born. :-)

[Liam]

Waded is pretty good easy too

Waded is ok for just making the layout of a map but beyond that I can't stand it.

[dr_st]

And not one of you mentioned DETH, although 30 out of the 32 cool maps on AV were done, in whole, or in part, with DETH.

[DooMBoy]

DETH, ZETH or DeePSea.

[Kid Airbag]

I think once you've built a good door, the right size, which is properly tagged so it doesn't 'climb' up the wall, and has DOORTRAK as its sidedef on the inside, and that also doesn't 'climb' up the wall, well then I think you've made a big leap.

Yeah, that's the part that's getting me. I finally made the door fucking work, but it looks like shit.

And for some reasons the items that are supposed to be on top of raised surfaces appear to be on the floor inside those surfaces.

[pritch]

increase the floor height in that sector to match.

[Erik]

I have no idea how people can actually build good levels with WA... it seems kind of primitive when compared to DETH or deepsea which probably are the 2 most powerful editors.

[Zaldron]

Well, he asked for an easy one. For the unexperienced DETH and Deepsea look like bloatware.

[InfraRed]

I just started as well....I found DETH to be a pain in the ass, DeaPSea is looking like the best even tho it took me about 2 days to get the damn doors to work...i still cant make doors that open from both sides....maybe if i wasnt lazy i'd read the tutorials....but heh, what can u do?

[Kid Airbag]

Yay, I'm getting the hang of it now. The only problem is, my secret door for some reason is open when the level starts, making it not much of a secret :/

Any help there would be appreciated.

[fraggle]

I couldn't for the life of me figure out how to make a door. I knew it had to be a sector between two other sectors, you know- that a door is itself a sector, but their explanation of how to do it was completely inadequate. So all of my WinDEU maps have teleporters and no doors!

DOLT

[deathz0r]

heh, it took me years to work out how to make a door.