Hi George. First of all fantastic work on the new RTC. It rocks BIG TIME!
I was wondering. Have you played DM Java? If so, what do you think of its engine?
I really like what Alandale started with that project. It's very intuitive and the editor in particular is very very good. What do you think of the possibility of converting RTC over to the DM Java engine?
Playing Dungeon Master + listening to Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me by The Cure = RAPTURE!!
what a pity. I would really like to see old DMjava dungeons in the RTC versions (recreate)!! but there`s always a chance to convert them manually.
Maybe someone would convert best DMjava dungeon to RTC format, and another person deal with graphics?
For DM Java
Order of Sar by Alistair
Dungeon of Doom 2 by Argainar
Drago's dungeon by Bahamut0
Original Dungeon Master dungeon by BigCalm
EOB 1 and 2 by David Hall, comments
- links currently dead, alternate downloads here and here
Moria - The Doors of Durin by Gerald Gantschnigg
Dmjava + Addon by Germanny
Dormalon by K.T.
Grags dungeon by Mark
The Fallen Temple by Michael Largey
Paul's dungeon by Paul
Black Crypt remake by Relig
Chaos Strikes Back dungeon by Wishbone
Or vice versa How about making it csbwin compatible?(just kidding here, so forget it..)
Generally a good idea to see how much of old is reconstructable..
Eob (AD&D) could actually work with the runes having to be found [would work like mage scrolls into spellbook]
Also it is quite a challenge to see how to work around things that
seem not possible at first glance
Should be decided on one at first, which seems to be dm2 atm
Adamo wrote:what a pity. I would really like to see old DMjava dungeons in the RTC versions (recreate)!! but there`s always a chance to convert them manually.
Absolutely.
I don't think that there's anything special in the DMJava engine that the RTC engine can't also do, so it's "just" a question of porting the maps / graphics from one to the other. If you have both editors open side by side then that should be fairly straightforward - a bit time consuming, but an awful lot less time that completely re-writing the RTC engine!
1. Special floor tiles: Zokathra, monster teleporters should deal with it (don`t allow monsters to pass through these tiles).
2. Special wall tiles: as far as I know, monsters (like ghosts,etc) cannot walk through real walls, as it is in DMjava, right? (untill GG will implement that function in monster editor)
Basically yes, you use teleporters in the wall and floor, and no, creatures don't walk through walls in RTC...if you want this bevaviour, you can hack it yourself or play under DM Java ... same with stair climbing
The characters in DM Java have an 'unlockable' ability when they reach a certain level, I found when playing around with the characters in the DM Java editor. I guess that this can be done by creating a custom attack method with a high level requirement to use, and replacing one of the three default attacks with it, but then that would leave you with one attack short.
Read the guides, look at the editor. There are sub-menus, so you can filter the attacks through a relay - have a punch be a punch, until at high levels you instead generate a second menu that says 'normal' or 'des ew' punch for example
This is of course assumign you want to be that exacting abotuthe port, and assumign anyone has even used those functions in a DM JAva dungeon you wish to port
I'm calling them sub-meuns, really they are menus - as you can generate them with any action (see the complex dungeon for an exampel of NPC interraction using them)
The only reason you would need a relay is to filter when that is available - the relay could detect if the party member was a adept ninja so you coudl decide whether a normal punch happened, or whether a sub menu came up
you could, right form the start, use the sub menu system so that you have 'attack' 'defend' and 'specil' options for each unarmed character that give you new menus such as punch/kick, 'block/parry' and then the third would be say war cry / special ability / climb. This would not require a relay oif all options were to be available from the start (eg a dragon charatcer can always breathe fire)
can you use a teleporter near the stairs then, wchich is teleporting monster on higher/lower level with a short delay?
Staircase is a special kind of a teleporter, I think?
OR: can staircase teleport monsters also, not only the party?
I was experimenting with this in DM/CSBwin where the engine was more limited - stairs are a special type of teleporter with a few quirk rules attached... i dunno if it would be easier in the end to have the engine do it, but then who needs that format change just now. I have not tried monsters on stairwells to see how they act, if they exists there and move off fine (and block party access) then it's all good! If not, i would actually fake stairwells and instead use a teleporrter system that dealt with monsters, party etc. Be a bit more work, but then that's how yah learn stuff and alos how you will every surprise peopel who know what the engine should be cabaple of during play : )
another thingie to convert a typical dungeon from DMjava properly is to:
1. let all monsters (not only gigglers) steal items from a party (I think it`s already doable in RTC)
2. monsters can also pick up items from a floor in DMjava.
3. oh, and mixing different kinds of monsters on one tile - I don`t know if it`s possible in RTC.
But, in general, I guess it wouldn`t be tremendously hard to convert a dungeon into RTC format, especially with the new, "powered" RTC. IMHO it might be worth of some work, because some DMjava dungeons are really cool and doesn`t have an equivalent in RTC/CSBwin. I always wanted to play some cool DMjava dungeons on CSBwin/RTC, because these are more approximated to original FTL game than DMjava.
Beo: I`ll try to recreate one of the games from DMjava (which DMjava game that doesn`t have an RTC equivalent, except original DM & CSB converted of course, is the best in your opinion?), but it might take a loooot of time... I don`t know RTC engine that well as CSBwin... Unless RTC veterans helps me
First of all, I need to pass #@$#$% exams and then finish my Dungeons of Death... then maybe convert it to RTC, if possible.
I think ghost can walk through normal walls in DM Java : if you look at the ghost zonesin the editor, they are surrounded by green squares on the walls not letting ghost passing. It would have no point if the ghost could not pass through wall.
DM Java editor is simple but far less powerful than RTCEd. Each tile type is a new object, so you cannot mix types. The only thing that could be difficult to do is the monster using stairs: in DM Java monster know that you have gone upstairs, and thus follow you.
I think in RTC it is more like original DM/CSB : monster switch to a wandering behaviour after some time when you leave the level. So even if you did a teleporting system, there is no garantee monster would take it, beside all the bother of making a teleport square looking like a stair. Am I wrong ?
But in fact, I have often considered making a Dungeon in DM Java using this stair feature : imagine a dungeon where there is NO safe place, with some meany monster chasing you everywhere (preferably a bit slow, but very strong, so that it will surprise you during sleep...).
Now I am looking into RTC to see how to implement some of the ConfluxIII features, just to explore RTC possibilities/training before making my own dungeon.
CSBwin and RTC should be faily compatible to create soem of the features - the scripting ability of DSAs is quite powerful, but I think RTC has taken enough leaps that nothign cannot be done another way
Eh, the problem with creating no safe place is that it can get annoying if you have not created a good game balance in the toughness of critters. I don't think the stairs thing would be a huge hassle in creatign a teleporter looking liek stairs, it will be more in the fine detaisl - battles on stairs, how and when stairs can get cblocked or not, how monsters and player interracts at the foot/top of the stairs, etc
OK, I'm really green with RTC's setup for creating dungeons, but I have to ask, how would you import new monsters/wall sets/sounds into RTC from DMJava?
All the images in DMJ are gifs and the sounds are wavs. Would someone need an extra program to convert it into RTC??
Or would you have to manually re-draw them in a different format?
Well I guess you could open them in something like MSPaint, then choose "Save As..." to save it as a .bmp file.
I suppose you would have to make sure that the dimensions of the new image are the same as the dimensions of the .bmp pictures you want to replace, otherwise it will look strange.
I just did something like that myself with the DMJava character portraits, fortunately they're all a standard 64x58 size so I didn't need to do anything there, except make sure the X/Y alignment was the same as all the other character portraits when I imported them into the RTC Editor. (X=0/Y=-24)
