So you know that a FG tilemap is a black and white PICT with the dimensions in pixels equal to the dimensions of the level in tiles. Similarly, a lightmap is a grayscale image of the same size. And like I explained to you before in (url="http://"http://www.ambrosiasw.com/webboard/Forum54/HTML/000349.html")this topic(/url), Xichron maps are PICTs in which a grey pixel (not black or white) represents a Xichron, right?
Well, there's more to it than that. I've been testing all the Paste PICT as menu items, and I've figured out a few things so you can make us Christmas presents more efficiently.
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Here are some general notes:
All PICTs should x pixels wide and y pixels high, where x is the number of tiles wide the level is and y the number of tiles high the level is.
All PICTs should be in grayscale format, 72 pixels per inch, PICT format.
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First of all come the FG tilemaps. From what I've found, you can use any gray value (black too but not white) to represent the filled-in tile areas and white for empty space, but everyone should stick with black.
In xichron maps, a xichron is represented by a gray (not black or white) pixel. You should use a gray near RGB(115, 115, 115) or HSB(0, 0, 45) for best results. If you stuck with black for your FG tilemap, you can put the gray pixels right on top of the FG tilemap and only the gray pixels will be Xichrons. (Important note: if you do paint the xichrons onto the FG tilemap directly, you can't use it as a FG tilemap anymore because gray pixels become tiles if you try to paste it as a FG tilemap. Always make a backup copy.)
Now comes the lightmap. This is a grayscale image, where the lightness of the gray directly represents the amount of light in that area of the level. I like to paint directly onto a copy of the FG tilemap so I can match up the light with the FG tiles, but if you do this, make sure to cover up the FG tilemap completely with the gray.
There's only one menu item left: BG tilemaps. That's what I spent time on this weekend ;). The secret is: BG tilemaps are similar to FG tilemaps except you must use RGB(187, 187, 187) instead of black where the tiles will go. BG tilemaps seem buggy, though, and I've gotten seemingly random acid and water tiles as BG. One thing does make up for this bug, though: BG tilemaps use random fill-tiles when you paste them as "smoothed", so you won't have to go in and touch them up too much, though you'll still have to check for floating liquid tiles. You may want to start with a BG tilemap before FG tilemap if you have many crunch tiles.
Something I just noticed while making the example level: BG tilesets like this only work on certain level types or BG tilesets, I'm not sure what exactly. For example, when I copied the level info from A Scent of Peril, I couldn't paste the BG tilemap, but I could if I copied the level info from an Ice level I'll keep you posted on what I find out about this, though please feel free to test on your own.
I've created an example level (50x50) you can look at. Get it (url="http://"http://pcheese.ferazel.net/downloads/pastePICTasmapexample.sit")here(/url), or it'll also be on the add-ons page eventually. It was created in Adobe Photoshop and pasted into the editor with no further editing, except that I placed the Starting Position and copied the level info from an ice level I'm er working on. There don't seem to be any liquid tiles this time, but maybe that's because I was working more with PICTs than Photoshop files this time.
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(url="http://"http://ninthkingdom.ferazel.net")OBW: The Ninth Kingdom for Ferazel's Wand coming soon (/url)
(This message has been edited by PCheese (edited 10-25-1987).)
