Dehacked Help [SOLVED]

[40oz]

This computer I'm using at the moment doesn't have dehacked or whacked or any other doom editing utilities on it, so for the purpose of simply changing automap map names, I decided i'd just use notepad (which I've never used for dehacked before).

I'm creating a dehacked patch for Plutonia 1024, so I copied the dehacked patch from Plutonia 2 to use as a template. Here's what I have so far:

Patch File for DeHackEd v3.0

# Note: Use the pound sign ('#') to start comment lines.

Doom version = 19
Patch format = 6

Text 14 12
level 1: congolevel 1: mt lazarev

Text 22 20
level 2: well of soulslevel 2: tenochtitlan

but when I tested it in prboom, the title on MAP01 read LEVEL 1: MT and MAP02 read LEVEL 2: TENOCHTITLA. What's going on here, is there like a character limit or something?

SOLVED: Yes! there is a character limit. The second number after "Text" is the number of characters for that line. I thought it identified the string or something. I'll go be dumb somewhere else now.

[plums]

All non-boom strings have a character limit. For map names it's usually the length of the original string + 3 characters, but for some it's fewer. At least for normal Doom/Doom 2, I don't know about Plutonia.

But isn't Plutinya Boom format? Then you can use Boom strings, which have virtually no limit. (You might run into problems if the string is longer than can be displayed on the automap screen in some ports, I'm not sure. It doesn't come up often.)

The format for Plutonia is like this:

# General version information
Doom version = 21
Patch format = 6

[STRINGS]
PHUSTR_1 = level 1: congo
PHUSTR_2 = level 2: well of souls
...
PHUSTR_30 = level 30: the gateway of hell

The order of the strings doesn't matter, but don't have any blank lines between strings.

More info about Boom strings can be found at https://github.com/fragglet/mbf/blob/master/boomdeh.txt

[DaniJ]

There is no such thing as a "Boom string". What you've done there is to convert the patch into BEX format, which addresses the string length limitation (among other things).

[plums]

Well, by Boom strings I meant "Boom's method of dealing with strings." But anyhow you are right.

[Gez]

And there are some Boom-specific strings, too. There's the new "you need so-and-so to open this door/activate this object" strings because Boom has additional lock types and five customizable startup lines. Maybe some more I don't remember on the top of my head.

[40oz]

The longest map name I have for Plutinya 1024 is "level xx: and all that could have been"

This dehacked file seemed to work fine:

Patch File for DeHackEd v3.0

# Note: Use the pound sign ('#') to start comment lines.

Doom version = 19
Patch format = 6

Text 14 38
level 1: congolevel xx: and all that could have been

Is it dumb to be using dehacked instead of bex for my boom project, even though it fills the requirements I need from it? I don't think I intend to use it for anything else, except maybe some goofy text screen interludes too. I have a natural tendency to gravitate to the least port-specific options when I can, and I'd prefer to be more fluent in dehacked than bex. Also I didn't have any bex patches on hand to use as a base because they are usually embedded in the wads.

For the time being I'll create my automap mapname replacements for both formats just in case. Thanks for the help!

[DaniJ]

40oz said:

Is it dumb to be using dehacked instead of bex for my boom project, even though it fills the requirements I need from it? I don't think I intend to use it for anything else, except maybe some goofy text screen interludes too. I have a natural tendency to gravitate to the least port-specific options when I can...

No, its not dumb to use the most widely support method if there is no good reason to do otherwise.

However, including both a regular Text and a BEX style [STRINGS] replacement in the same patch file/lump is pretty stupid, though. In that situation the best case is that both methods are supported and end result is the same. However if the BEX method isn't supported you run the risk of either a runtime error or inducing warnings about the missing feature. Personally I'd pick only one method.

I'd also suggest applying proper case to your text string replacements in case they are drawn using a font with both upper and lower case characters. Not many ports support this but some do (those that don't will deal with the mixed case).

[40oz]

Oops that wasn't what I meant, I created two separate files that essentially do the same in two different formats, and was going to choose one depending on who sways me one way or the other. I was almost sure that adding both types of entries in the same file could create conflicts. I think I'll stick with dehacked, thanks!

[plums]

Oh I guess Boom allows you to have unlimited string lengths, even with the Dehacked method of string replacement? I actually didn't realize this. Yeah go ahead and stick with that format if you want, then.