21 replies to this topic

[King Diamond]

Yes... After a quick test this morning I'm almost 100% sure of it...
This topic is of concern of every modder, who uses an unmodified original tileset for building his own area. I mean - unmodified GRAPHICS.

If you don't modify GRAPHICS (including overlays) it is NOT necessary to duplicate a .tis for such area. All new/altered actors will go to .are file + u can use area's .bcs effectively to make some scripting for it. But .wed reference in such new area will point to the original .tis and it WORKS! U may create 100 new areas that use only ONE .tis. It saves A LOT of download and installation space.

Remeber all those Beregosts, Candlekeeps, DSotSC areas etc.????


P.S. I may be TOTALLY wrong, but test are going well right now....

Edited by King Diamond, 14 January 2005 - 03:41 AM.

[horred the plague]

Yes... After a quick test this morning I'm almost 100% sure of it...
This topic is of concern of every modder, who uses an unmodified original  tileset for building his own area. I mean - unmodified GRAPHICS.

If you don't modify GRAPHICS (including overlays) it is NOT necessary to duplicate a .tis for such area. All new/altered actors will go to .are file + u can use area's .bcs effectively to make some scripting for it. But .wed reference in such new area will point to the original .tis and it WORKS! U may create 100 new areas that use only ONE .tis. It saves A LOT of download and installation space.

Remeber all those Beregosts, Candlekeeps, DSotSC areas etc.???? 


P.S. I may be TOTALLY wrong, but test are going well right now....

No. you're not wrong...but here's the gig:

1) these mods weren't made at the same chronological time
2) most of these mods weren't designed to be working together, as they now are :closedeyes:
3) some of the modmakers involved have expressed a desire to NOT have their mods made into part of a "megapack"--you have to install their mods "as is"

or I would have done what you are currently doing on your pc, years ago. Beregost .tis being the best example I can think of offhand.

[King Diamond]

3) some of the modmakers involved have expressed a desire to NOT have their mods made into part of a "megapack"--you have to install their mods "as is" 

I thought about it. But definitely DSotSC, BoneHill and newest NTotSC won't be used without BGT installed so we can optimize them at least.

[Sir BillyBob]

I am all for this. It takes forever to upload these files and the fact that they contain tis you already have is a sore spot to me.

However, here is the problem. If you point the WED to a TIS already in the game, you have to hope and pray that no other mod modifies that TIS file. Otherwise, you just screwed up your own mod.

I thought about this for BoneHill (my first mod) and so I used my own tiles and decided to modify each area so players won't bitch about seeing the same damn area over and over again.

Only BH1400 and BH1300 are original outside areas. All others are modified to some degree. The three levels inside BoneHill are also originals so that is 5 large tiles that we can save space on.

DSotSC? Gag, I don't remember anymore. I will have to look at each area.

[King Diamond]

However, here is the problem.  If you point the WED to a TIS already in the game, you have to hope and pray that no other mod modifies that TIS file.  Otherwise, you just screwed up your own mod.

The same thing or worse could happen if somebody would've rebuilt some of the original, for example, SoA tilesets - Promenade or something replacing it with favourite porno photos - and it'll ruin the game at all....
So I think this is not a problem that we need to stuck with. There're some kind of rules that modders must obey

[Vlad]

You'll be surprised to learn that there is a small DOS program called TIS pack utility made by Per Olafsson which decreases the size of a regular TIS file approximately 10 times. And who does distribute TIS files in the installation package nowdays?

[NiGHTMARE]

True, but that only helps reduce the download size. Once you've installed the mod, you're dealing with .tis' again and they take up the same amount of hd space as they always did (plus they don't look quite so pretty any more ).

[Sir BillyBob]

You'll be surprised to learn that there is a small DOS program called TIS pack utility made by Per Olafsson which decreases the size of a regular TIS file approximately 10 times.      And who does distribute TIS files in the installation package nowdays?

Actually Vlad, not only do I use tispack, I also use the NeJ routine at the end of the TP2 to untispack the files. As Nightmare mentions, it doesn't matter in the game, the final graphic is a TIS file. What KD and I are working on is reducing the size of some mods by pointing the WED files of areas to use the TIS already in the game. As long as no other mod maker modifies that area, we can do this. Worse case, I put out a small patch later that includes a clean TIS file. But for now, this process will save on the downloads because I can reduce the fle size (which already uses TIZ files) to 40MB instead of over 200MB.

[Vlad]

Well, I don't understand who needs the whole unmodified TIS files taken from BG2 for the mod in BG2? But this is a rhetorical question. Please don't answer. Just take in mind that if WED of the custom area doesn't find its TIS (even the original BG2 TIS from the BIFF) in the override folder then the game normally crashes. The only case when you can point WED to its TIS located in BIFF is when the modder doesn't modify neither graphics, nor the name of the area. Then go to my question above.

[EDIT] Actually I agree that Candlekeep and other surrounding areas can be removed from NeJ2 if they are already in BP-BGT. Thanks.

[EDIT2] I'll add the conditions IF_FILE_EXISTS into my Setup-NeJ2.TP2 to check whether the corresponding TIS files (from BP-BGT) exist in the override or not. For now there are five TIS files from NeJ2 which can be removed in case they have been already located in the override folder.

Edited by Vlad, 16 January 2005 - 12:17 PM.

[King Diamond]

Just take in mind that if WED of the custom area doesn't find its TIS (even the original BG2 TIS from the BIFF) in the override folder then the game normally crashes.

Sorry, m8, but u r not right there...
TIS can be either in some biff or in \override\ - it doesn't matter...

The only case when you can point WED to its TIS located in BIFF is when the modder doesn't modify neither graphics, nor the name of the area. Then go to my question above.

Just try yourself - save one area under as much different names as u want, and try to CLUA them.... U can even modify not only .are contents adding/deletting actors, spawns etc., but .wed's contents as well (walls, regions...). And it all will work with original tis....

Edited by King Diamond, 17 January 2005 - 01:26 AM.

[Sir BillyBob]

KD, not sure how you got that lucky but I have had the same results as Vlad on modifying the WED file. In theory it shouldn't care what the TIS file is but I seem to have better results when telling the ARE to use another WED than to tell the WED to use another TIS.

For the repackaged DSotSC, I just modified all the ARE files to use the WED of the pre-existing areas. When I first attempted this by modifying the WEDs, some worked and some didn't.

[King Diamond]

KD, not sure how you got that lucky but I have had the same results as Vlad on modifying the WED file.  In theory it shouldn't care what the TIS file is but I seem to have better results when telling the ARE to use another WED than to tell the WED to use another TIS.

For the repackaged DSotSC, I just modified all the ARE files to use the WED of the pre-existing areas.  When I first attempted this by modifying the WEDs, some worked and some didn't.

Have you tried them from my archive or made them yourself?
I've checked every area I changed and all is working pretty well...

[EDIT] I've made a fresh BP-BGT-ALL BIG MODS install yesterday with new DSotSC configuration with all optimized areas (all unnecessary .tiz 've been deleted prior to installation and weds replaced) and I've just tried every modified area - they ALL WORK.

So about WEDs. I've modified them with NI updating only a .tis reference - not anything else.

Edited by King Diamond, 17 January 2005 - 09:30 AM.

[Sir BillyBob]

It is a hit-or-miss. I have seen this problem for months now when I build areas. I am not sure what I am doing wrong or if it is something else that causes this. Again, most areas work, but I would say every third or fourth area may not. Don't know if it is related to areas with overlays only or areas with fireplaces, or some other graphics.

I have also found that sometimes the problem is because I have extracted out the whole area into the override. If the TIS file is there and it is the same file in a biff, the game will crash. I guess because it is the same file, no changes to it.

So I just modify the ARE file to use another WED. It seems to always work.

By the way, I use NI to do this change, not sure if that is the cause or not.

[King Diamond]

It is a hit-or-miss.  I have seen this problem for months now when I build areas.  I am not sure what I am doing wrong or if it is something else that causes this.  Again, most areas work, but I would say every third or fourth area may not.  Don't know if it is related to areas with overlays only or areas with fireplaces, or some other graphics.

All extra graphics for fireplaces and such objects are getting stored in .tis as well after the main set of tiles (as overlays do) and .wed contains all info about how to draw it. BUt I haven't found ANY way to recreate such areas - there's not a trace of such possibility in any of available editors (am I wrong?)
So, this could produce a problem in theory when u're working with such areas.

[Sir BillyBob]

I got this tool from Bardez. It allows you to copy a TIS file even with the fireplaces. Vlad uses a hex-editor to do the same thing. He had the details posted on TeamBG.

Attached Files

•  tileedit.zip.txt   43.21K   7 downloads

[hlidskialf]

IIRC areas will crash if the files are located in a biff or an override, but the other ambients, .tis references, etc... are not in the same location. So if you extract an area to the override, but the ambients for that area are still in the original biff, you get a crash.
I can't swear to this as I'm going by memory and can't check anything at the moment. However I seem to recall something pertanent along these lines. It's also why you can move to a new area fine, but coming back later causes a crash since the decompressed biff file is now in the cache file, and the references to the override files get fubar.
Did I make any sense at all? I need coffee and to get outta this shop. (I'm currently covering the inmate carpentry shop. Damn it's loud and dusty in here!)

[Sir BillyBob]

I thought they only made license plates? Unless they are in China, then they make everything we buy in WalMart.

Yes, an area will crash if the unbiffed area can't find the ambient. BoneHill drove me crazy on this because of the ambients used in Nalia's keep. I had to extract all of them and put them in the override or else the area would crash on the first, second or sometimes third time you entered it. Someone on TeamBG confirmed that for me back then.

Hey, as a thought. If I biff the keep's areas, will the game engine find the original ambients again or will the problem now be that the ambients are in a different biff from the area?

[Stone Wolf]

Just make sure the inmates aren't making throwing stars. That's what my friends and I did in shop.

[Vlad]

Yes, I agree with hlid that ambients and animations along with the corresponding TIS file should be at the same location. If you extract and modify something in your area graphics you should extract all other related files. The animated overlays are also problematic and if being modified for BG2 adaptation require the both files would be in the override folder. If KD could solve all these problems just as he described I would say he is really lucky. I have spent many months on solving these problems and I hope it was not waste of time. Also WinBIFF doesn't extract WED files properly but damages their header and animated overlay offsets. Strangely enough but NI also saves WED files messing the animated overlays. Only DLTCEP is capable of extracting and then proper saving all the area files. All in all let KD finish his work. I need about ten areas from BP-BGT to re-use in NeJ3, so I'll probably wait a bit for this project being finished.

Edited by Vlad, 17 January 2005 - 03:12 PM.

[Sir BillyBob]

Hmm, Vlad may have solved my water overlay problem. I extracted each of the problem areas using NI because Weidu was extracting 0 byte files. Those areas then had weird water overlays. I didn't think about extracting them using DLTCEP (sometimes it just isn't as user-friendly as NI). I'll have to see if I can test this.