pick'n mix wall textures in SLADE

[Soundblock]

Hey

I've been building a map for ZDoom in Doom Builder, pick and mixing some of my favorite wall textures from miscellaneous wads hosted on Doomworld.

I'm new to SLADE, but bar going back to DEUTEX (which I haven't touched in years) I understand it is the way to go for wad resource management. I like what little I've seen of the interface so far - seems straightforward.

However, my first snag in trying to ahcieve a single wad out of my current level design effort is that Doom Builder and SLADE, at least by default, reference wall texture resources differently. For example, from retres.wad (Eternal Doom resources) I've been using the texture Doom Builder calls "3OCEAN6". In SLADE the same graphic is called "3SBLUE3", which makes further organizing more difficult than I had hoped. Does anyone know if there is a way to get SLADE to list a wad's wall textures a] by themselves (separate from monstersprites and such), and b] using the same naming convention Doom Builder does?

I'm guessing each editor calls up different registries inherent to the wad format? I never quite got a hang of the inner workings of the doom files' graphics logistics. Any links to a good explanation of those wouldn't go astray either.

EDIT: typo.

[Chris Hansen]

Soundblock said:

Does anyone know if there is a way to get SLADE to list a wad's wall textures a] by themselves (separate from monstersprites and such)

Just below the window with all the entries, click the dropdown menu called "Show". I think that's the one you're looking for :)

[Soundblock]

Chris Hansen said:

Just below the window with all the entries, click the dropdown menu called "Show". I think that's the one you're looking for :)

Yeah, I found that one, but that's about as deep as I've dipped my toe in it so far. :-)

SLADE only has a mode for displaying (all) "graphics" though. Being able to separately display sprites, textures, etc. sure would make sifting through the numerous resources easier, especially in haystack needled cases like these.

Thanks though, appreciate the input.

[GreyGhost]

Soundblock said:

Does anyone know if there is a way to get SLADE to list a wad's wall textures a] by themselves (separate from monstersprites and such), and b] using the same naming convention Doom Builder does?

Click on the lump named TEXTURE1 (near the top of the Entries list), then the Edit Textures button, that will open a new tab with the list of textures Doom Builder is referencing in that wad. Each texture in that list is made from one or more patches (which is what you've been looking at in the Entries list), if you scroll down the texture list and select 3OCEAN6 you'll notice that its Patches list contains just one entry - 3SBLUE3.

[Soundblock]

GreyGhost said:

Click on the lump named TEXTURE1 (near the top of the Entries list), then the Edit Textures button, that will open a new tab with the list of textures Doom Builder is referencing in that wad. Each texture in that list is made from one or more patches (which is what you've been looking at in the Entries list), if you scroll down the texture list and select 3OCEAN6 you'll notice that its Patches list contains just one entry - 3SBLUE3.

That probably just saved me a week of clicking around aimlessly - consider yourself bear hugged! Any other pointers you can throw my way about navigating SLADE, with my current objective in mind? I mean, I've now found the first of the about 100 textures that I want to include into my new map plasmaplant.wad - the mind now wanders on how to nest the myriad textures into one... I guess I need to export the textures as I find them to PNG or something, then start SLADE from scratch and import them all en masse into a new wad?

EDIT: missing word

[GreyGhost]

There are texture export options but at the moment Slade's being a little cantankerous, which makes it difficult to do a step-by-step guide. Another option is to create a new wad (Ctrl+Shift+W or "New Wad Archive" icon) which will open a new tab named "UNSAVED (wad)", create PP_START and PP_END marker entries (Archive/New/Entry or "New Entry" icon) then copy/paste the patches you want to use between those markers. When done, highlight the patches and select Gfx/Add to TEXTUREx from the mouse right-click menu, click Yes when asked if you "wish to create or import a texture definition list", select the Doom format and "Import from Base Resource Archive" options and click OK. That will create valid PNAMES and TEXTURE1 lumps for Doom 2 with your custom patches/textures appended to the end of each. Creating a texture lump this way means you'll wind up with a bunch of single-patch textures which have been named after their patches, you can rename them in the texture editor tab if required. Hope this helps.

I think Kappes Buur has a tutorial page or two for Slade but (apart from the installation tutorial) I'm not sure where to find them.

[Gez]

You can open your wad and the resource wad both at once. Open the texture editor in both.

Now, if I'm not mistaken, you can copy/paste textures from the resource wad's texture editor tab to your wad's texture editor tab. SLADE should handle copying the needed patches transparently.

For information, do not hesitate to look up the wikis.
https://github.com/sirjuddington/SLADE/wiki
http://doomwiki.org/wiki/TEXTURE1_and_TEXTURE2

[Soundblock]

I'm following on your advice and I'm starting to see good results - the wall texture directories are filling up nicely. However, the 64x64 textures aren't showing up, so I guess the floor/ceiling textures (flats) need their own PP_START/PP_END separators.

How do I append these in a way that Doom Builder/Doom understands? I tried just adding another set of start/end separators directly after the wall texture listings, the way it looked to my eyes in the source files, but so far floor texture graphics drag'n-drop'ed across don't show up in Doom Builder...

[Gez]

Soundblock said:

I'm following on your advice and I'm starting to see good results - the wall texture directories are filling up nicely. However, the 64x64 textures aren't showing up, so I guess the floor/ceiling textures (flats) need their own PP_START/PP_END separators.

F_START/F_END, actually.

What is usually done is putting them in-between FF_START (two Fs) and F_END (only one F), the reason for that being some obscure hack for compatibility with the original (vanilla) exe. Modern ports (except, obviously, Choco) are just fine with FF_START/FF_END or F_START/F_END.

Have you looked at this tutorial?

[Soundblock]

Gez said:

F_START/F_END, actually.

What is usually done is putting them in-between FF_START (two Fs) and F_END (only one F), the reason for that being some obscure hack for compatibility with the original (vanilla) exe. Modern ports (except, obviously, Choco) are just fine with FF_START/FF_END or F_START/F_END.

Have you looked at this tutorial?

Checked tutorials and links. The wikis I've mostly looked at before, but I did pick up some new fragments of understanding from each place since its more relevant to me at current. I don't yet have a full grasp of all things wadly and probably never will, but the links helped, thanks.

So far managed to create a wad containing all of the flats and patches (wall textures) from the largest contributor - eternres.wad. I've lifted less numerously from the other texture wads, so they should hopefully be a breeze (crosses fingers).

Had to fidget quite a bit with SLADE to get successful wad-to-wad flat/patch(texture) imports. Realizing what a good thing closing the texture browser window after each texture copy-paste is, to instigate the editor to synchronise memory/file texture listings. This was maybe the biggest hurdle. Seems the editor should do that automatically when you save the wad that contains the texture listings, but hey, I'm actually making what looks to be permanent headway in what seemed kinda daunting before I began, so I'm not complaining. Also finding it a very good idea to regularily check the additions to the new resource wad over in Doom Builder. This to keep tabs on each and every texture as it is added, rather than trying to mass copy everything in one go, which I clubfistedly tried at first and repeatedly failed at.

Btw - any tips on how to get Doom to recognize the animated textures I've copied over to my new wad? I see the wad file contains an "animated" listing, but I'm not sure how to edit it correctly...

EDIT: Is this my best bet for Doom animated textures or does SLADE have an easier way for getting Doom to recognise these? http://doomwiki.org/wiki/ANIMATED

[Gez]

You can edit ANIMATED lumps directly in SLADE (no need to bother with swantbls and its syntax).

However, there's no easier way to add animations to Doom, no. Vanilla Doom has a hardcoded list of switches and animations, so you cannot add more (you can cheat by conflating several textures into the same animated texture, but then you have to use offsets to get the part you want, and you cannot tile it easily, and also it's just goddamn ugly). There's also ZDoom's ANIMDEFS, which are more flexible and powerful, but that limits your mod's compatibility with ports even more than using Boom's ANIMATED.

[Soundblock]

Gez said:

You can edit ANIMATED lumps directly in SLADE (no need to bother with swantbls and its syntax).

However, there's no easier way to add animations to Doom, no. Vanilla Doom has a hardcoded list of switches and animations, so you cannot add more (you can cheat by conflating several textures into the same animated texture, but then you have to use offsets to get the part you want, and you cannot tile it easily, and also it's just goddamn ugly). There's also ZDoom's ANIMDEFS, which are more flexible and powerful, but that limits your mod's compatibility with ports even more than using Boom's ANIMATED.

OK. Guess I'll try and just overwrite an existing set of animated textures inherent to doom2.wad, for my animated texture needs.