Doom Builder Automap preview plugin would be cool

[ptoing]

This is something that would be pretty cool. Just a plugin where you can watch a preview of what the map would look like if it was fully revealed by the player, taking flags like draw 1-sided, don't show on automap, etc. into account. Just a little suggestion to people who make plugins and the like. :B

[scifista42]

Select all linedefs in your map, give them the "Shown" flag, playtest your map and look at the automap, then go back to the editor and undo the last action. The effects of "Hidden" and "Secret" flags will be as they should be, even with the "Shown" flag set along with them.

[boris]

Or use the iddt cheat.

[scifista42]

IDDT shows even hidden linedefs, though. Also in (G)ZDoom and/or Zandronum, "Secret" flagged linedefs are highlighted when you use IDDT.

[Linguica]

IDBEHOLDA?

[scifista42]

You know the problem with IDBEHOLDA, it shows all lines as grey until you actually see them, and the OP is apparently interested in a proper preview of the automap's colors of each line too (he mentioned those flagged as "draw 1-sided", aka the "Secret" flag).

[Kappes Buur]

I use a plugin called GZDoom

[boris]

What would be the use of such a mode anyway, besides looking nice.

[mouldy]

Would be handy for tidying the automap without having to run the game just to see if you missed anything. Does gzdoom builder do that?

[boris]

You can partially emulate that by using custom linedef color presets (let all linedefs with the "not shown on automap" be the same color as your background and all linedefs with teh "show as 1-sided on automap" show as your solid linedef color).
It still shows vertices, though, so it's a bit messy. A "real" automap preview would be nicer for that.

[Impboy4]

*cough*https://www.doomworld.com/vb/doom-editing/67520-automapper-make-maps-of-doom-levels-like-the-in-game-automap/*cough*

[printz]

DETH has this feature.

[ptoing]

Thanks for the replies everyone.

scifista: This works reasonably well, thanks :)

Kappes Buur: I used GZDB as well. Does it have such a feature?

Impboy4: I could not get that to work. If I point it to a wad it tells me there is no map in my wad. No clue what I am doing wrong.

printz: That would help if DETH would actually run on 64bit Windows. Setting up VMWare to run some WinXP build and then check in DETH or something is significantly slower than scifista's workaround.

boris: Pretty much what mouldy said. I hate cluttered automaps, esp in modern high detail maps it makes the maps less than usable. So in the map I am working on I am removing all detail that is on the ceiling only, unless it is a big landmark, as well as many lines which are in places the player generally can not go. Like if you got some little inset panel in a wall, those lines get hidden and the 2 sided line made solid. The automap comes out looking nice and usable.

[Kappes Buur]

ptoing said:

Kappes Buur: I used GZDB as well. Does it have such a feature?

Same as ZDoom.
Both have Automap Options to allow you to customize the automap to your heart's content. Then, to preview the full automap, just hit Tab then iddt twice.

For example a map from Winters Fury



+/- to zoom in/out
F to follow

For that matter, if you have the automap displayed, overlay the options and see how the automap changes as you apply different options.

[scifista42]

ptoing said:

Kappes Buur: I used GZDB as well. Does it have such a feature?

No, GZDB doesn't have such a feature.

[ptoing]

Kappes Buur said:

Same as ZDoom.
Both have Automap Options to allow you to customize the automap to your heart's content. Then, to preview the full automap, just hit Tab then iddt twice.

For example a map from Winters Fury

http://i.imgur.com/QUtZnk9.png

+/- to zoom in/out
F to follow

For that matter, if you have the automap displayed, overlay the options and see how the automap changes as you apply different options.

Haha, my bad, I somehow read your original post as "GZDoom Builder" instead of just GZDoom.

Though GZDoom's capability of editing the colours of stuff does not really help, since you can not make it hide lines that are not shown on automap if you use IDDT.

As I wrote above, I am editing my lines to make the level as readable as possible on the automap.

[boris]

[baja blast rd.]

Boris is so cool.

Is there a tutorial on how to design plug-ins?

I wanted to make a very basic one but I don't at all know what various functions are called in Doom Builder's code, which seems like a prerequisite of actually making a plug-in. Okay, it's possible to find out some of them from the available source codes of plug-ins, but not all of them.

Seems like GZDB's source is freely available. Time to learn this language to whatever minimal degree I can muster. :D

[esselfortium]

That's awesome, boris. That will be very, very useful.

[Pinchy]

I thought about checking for something like this after my last map where I did a really clean automap.

Similar to the sound plugin where a single click can toggle the lines, but for the hidden on automap flag with a view that matches a fully explored automap.

[Xaser]

Holy sheep shit, that looks absurdly useful. o_O

boris for human president 2017

[mouldy]

wow, that looks perfect

[boris]

Thanks for the kind words. Not sure when there will be a release.

rdwpa said:

Is there a tutorial on how to design plug-ins?

Seems like GZDB's source is freely available. Time to learn this language to whatever minimal degree I can muster. :D

If you know any C-like language getting into C# should not be a problem. You can check out the DB2 Copy & Paste Sector Properties plugin. It's so old that it will probably not even compile for GZDB, but it's as basic as a plugin can be and is short and well documented.
Depending on what you want to do you the BuilderPlug.cs file can be enough. If you want to create your own mode it's best to use on of the existing modes as a base. For example for the automap mode I took the linedefs mode (from DB2) as a base, ripped out everything that's unnecessary and changed the rendering to look like the Doom automap.

Pinchy said:

Similar to the sound plugin where a single click can toggle the lines, but for the hidden on automap flag with a view that matches a fully explored automap.

The sound plugin only needs to toggle a single flag, but for the automap there are two flags to take into account: "never show" and "show as 1-sided". One option would be to toggle the "show as 1-sided" flag on LMB and the "never show" flag on RMB. Another option would be to utilize the default "insert item" and "delete item" key binds. That wouldn't be a break with the other editing modes, where a click selects a linedef. But that poses a problem, since the default selection color is red and 1-sided walls are shown as red, too, in automap mode.

[ptoing]

Awesome work, boris. Hope this plugin is ready for the public soon :D

You could also make it so that it cycles through 1-sided/show/never show or something by just using LMB, on double sided lines that is. And of course you would have to have some way to show never shown lines, or else how do you click them. Maybe holding down CTRL or something could show all lines, and make the never shown ones a dark grey.

[Mechadon]

Yea this is really great, thanks for your hard work boris :). I might actually take the time to do proper automap cleaning now.

[boris]

https://github.com/biwa/automapmode/releases/tag/v0.1.0

Left click on a line to toggle the "show as 1s on automap" flag.
Right click on a line to toggle the "never show on automap" flag.
Holding Ctrl shows lines that are not drawn, either because there was no height change (gray) or the "never show on automap" flag is set (light gray).

When you zoom out short lines will not be drawn. That's normal behavior of the plotter, but normally you don't see it because vertices (which are not drawn in automap mode) overlap those lines. Not sure if I can circumvent this and keep a good performance.

[ptoing]

All I can say is, thank you very much. This is awesome.
The small lines disappearing issue is not that big of a deal IMO. Would be nice if you could somehow circumvent it, but I wouldn't worry to much.

[MaxED]

ptoing said:

Would be nice if you could somehow circumvent it.

Done :)

[ptoing]

MaxED said:

Done :)

(^_^)b

[MaxED]

Show me your secrets, map!


Hexen has no secrets...