DescentBB

...it's... possible... and yeah I'm pretty sure what we have is the 1.2 source.
do_final_boss_hacks is the function that sets up all the special exit things.

I've tested this boss after the HAM changes for this mission in my "bosstest" 10-map series and nothing of the sort happened when killing the Tycho Brahe boss. He just exploded like every other robot and the appropriate countdown started. I've also encountered this boss in custom levels and the cutaway didn't happen either. I'm positive I played through Rebirth in those instances.

Well, one for two then -- the thief thing still applies. He'll probably be nigh invincible by mission end.

No one said he has to be in every level. Even if he is, the last levels are supposed to be hard

You misunderstand.
I want to have that experience.

Just think that it's something good to know about. Not saying it's something evil that must be expunged (well, it is thief, so it is evil, but not in that way ).

Ok then! I think he'll be handlable, considering the fact that earthshaker missiles are probably going to be quite abundant in the later levels. I don't think any thief can survive being face shakered, unless his HP can actually go into the realm of the bosses late enough in a mission.

That could be interesting...

More thoughts:
I never liked how D2 kinda nearly forced you to save the vast majority of your shakers for bosses. At the same time though, if they'll be given out like candy we'll want to put the player in situations where they really need to use them, to force them to save the missiles enough to stop the secondary trigger from becoming a "clear level" button.

For the maximum effectiveness, we'd want to start putting the players in those situations a few levels before we start giving them the shakers. So they'll already know, even on getting the first few, what they need to save them for... making their introduction a relief instead of the simple novelty it was in D2.

One other thought from the code-reading; has anyone confirmed whether or not D2 DOS will load levels past 30? There was a comment in the header that suggested that was a more recent change.

Would be pretty gay if it didn't, going all Doom WAD on us like that :/

Rly? Cause all we'd have to do is split the pack in two for the dosfolk.
There are plenty of "Best Of" albums that come on two discs.

Trying something out for 31. I had saved this picture for a while to try and emulate it in D2... albeit I can't use blue like the image, but I think it looks decent?





Obviously texture work needs cleaning up in some places, and I cannot keep this level of detail throughout... but it looks neat!

Probably don't want to make the whole level look like any one thing, or it loses its D2-ness, but you can do that bit of things reasonably efficiently.

There are light blue textures to use though, no idea why you went with the pistacchio-cream

rock022
rock330
rock334
rock345

Pick your poison

However, this area does seem a bit cube heavy and apart from the pretty geometry, nothing appears to be going on in it, it's not very interactive either. At least a central pillar or two could spice things up.

Xfing wrote: ↑Wed Mar 28, 2018 4:15 pm Ok then! I think he'll be handlable, considering the fact that earthshaker missiles are probably going to be quite abundant in the later levels. I don't think any thief can survive being face shakered, unless his HP can actually go into the realm of the bosses late enough in a mission.

On the other hand, do you have plans to introduce the Thief at Level 1? If his debut could be put off a bit longer, maybe the HP could be nerfed in the HAM to allow for better scaling (so it still feels like the default base amount whenever he first comes in).

There's a mission out called Trinity United that compiles all he Parallax missions. I didn''t have much trouble destroying the thief on level 54 there.

Naphtha wrote: ↑Sat Mar 31, 2018 7:25 am

Xfing wrote: ↑Wed Mar 28, 2018 4:15 pm Ok then! I think he'll be handlable, considering the fact that earthshaker missiles are probably going to be quite abundant in the later levels. I don't think any thief can survive being face shakered, unless his HP can actually go into the realm of the bosses late enough in a mission.

On the other hand, do you have plans to introduce the Thief at Level 1? If his debut could be put off a bit longer, maybe the HP could be nerfed in the HAM to allow for better scaling (so it still feels like the default base amount whenever he first comes in).

Nah I'm planning to have the thief appear starting with Zeta Aquilae. This is actually a very good idea you're proposing, we just have to calculate the scaling, lower the base HP accordingly and we're golden.

Based on my observations with TU, I think the scaling itself is scaled, so that is something to keep in mind.

Current_level_num presumably starts at 1 so it has the standard shield count on the first level. In this case we want to start that from 19.
For 19 the multiplier is (19+7)/8 = 26/8
So if you give the thief 8/26 the normal shield count (normal is apparently 450, so approximately 138.46), it will be at the normal shield count by level 19. It will also scale more slowly after that.

Guess that's alright and quite desirable. I'll keep that in mind! Thanks, Sirius.

On an odd note - LightWolf, why did you pick Alien1.PIG for Metarock Mine? I find that choice quite unfounded given the texture base of the level. I think it'd look much better either with Fire or Descent 1's PIG. Please experiment with it and choose the best palette.

I looked, and Fire makes one room look better - at the cost of a different room's graphics. Descent doesn't change too much. All in all I think I like Alien1 best.

I checked too. metl140 looks crappy in Fire, while rock102 looks worse in alien1. Rock 188 looks significantly different between the two, but even more so in D1 - it's not as warm. Rock223 looks surprisingly well in alien1, but it does look best in d1. Rock 102 and metl140 both look great in d1, so there's no need to compromise. The white lab textures also look best in d1, as do robots such as the plasma driller or the fusion hulk (the shade of purple is the most vivid in d1). That room with Baloris accents also looks real good in d1, so all in all I think d1 would be the best and least lossy palette for this level. I dare you to change my mind

- rbot089 looks better in Alien1
- ceil014 looks better in Alien1
- rock057 looks better in Alien1
- Orange Fatty looks better in Alien1
- I hate it when DLE rejects the shift key...
- rock296 and its two variants look better in Alien1
- rock315 looks a little better in Alien1

In the end, it really boils down to which textures are most important.

What do some other people think?

LightWolf wrote: ↑Sat Mar 31, 2018 2:58 pm - rbot089 looks better in Alien1

Utterly unimportant, I'd have it replaced with rock002 anyway, since this one looks too, well... robotic. Rock002 looks just fine, if not the best, in d1.pig

- ceil104 looks better in Alien1

No texture with this number exists. If you meant Metl104, then it was optimized to look best in descent.pig and it does.

- rock057 looks better in Alien1

It totally doesn't. It was also one of the textures introduced back in d1, so the d1 palette displays its purest form. Alien1 has it become too brownish and the shading on its grays become less subtle.

- Orange Fatty looks better in Alien1

The difference is that under descent1 it's marginally darker, but it remains a vivid orange so I see this gripe as very minor and not necessarily founded.

- I hate it when DLE rejects the shift key...

What?

- rock296 and its two variants look better in Alien1

These are some of the textures that weren't back in d1, so they don't work the best with that palette. That said, they're still fully presentable, albeit lean a bit more towards yellow than they do in the d2 palettes, where they're used in at least 3 systems in Counterstrike. Still, they're pretty generic textures so I would let it slide actually.

- rock315 looks a little better in Alien1

The difference here is not considerable at all. It still looks perfectly good in d1, although again, more yellowish than orange-ish.

In the end, it really boils down to which textures are most important.

Well in regards to this particular level, none of the examples you quoted is particularly convincing, since none of these textures is like super vital to this level, and those that are, still look ok or even good in descent.pig. This level's most important textures are rock 193/251 and rock 223, all of which look right at home in d1. Also, rock 149 looks more vivid, since descent1 is the best with pinks. Rock 102 looks bad in alien1 and just fine in descent. The only texture that looks really whacked out in descent is rock 333, with ugly greenish highlights showing through - still it was used in Puuma Sphere's first level, even though a similar effect is noticeable under alien2. Descent.pig has a bad range with the oranges, making them lean towards yellows mostly, but it could still be replaced with rock 224 to good effect (or 317, or even 313).

What do some other people think?

Yeah, I wonder about that too

The level is in a good place now with only a single custom texture in it, so it's easy enough to make changes at this stage. Once we settle, though, I'm definitely going to be sprucing it up with some D1 textures here and there (within reason of course)

Did I say ceil104? I meant ceil014...

LightWolf wrote: ↑Sat Mar 31, 2018 3:48 pm Did I say ceil104? I meant ceil014...

Yet another texture introduced in D1, so the difference in rendering between it and alien1 is marginal at best. It's definitely well suited for use with descent.pig, so once again, weird choice of examples here. There are textures that change much more drastically in descent.pig.

Anyway, Baloris Prime seems like an OK choice of palette for this level, but in that case it would be nice to change the red texture to something that looks better in it. There are plenty to choose from too, so it's either that or changing the palette to descent.pig. I know we probably have an overrepresentation of descent.pig outside of the solar system. For equality's sake we should have 36/7 = 5 levels rendered in each palette. 3 of 5 for the Counterstrike system levels will be filled by levels from the Counterstrike portion itself, so the rest should probably go in Vertigo, with 6 more levels in descent.pig. Quotas are usually not a good solution if there is no justification for them other than that they seem fair(just like in real life), so we should primarily look at what palette looks best for the given level. Fortunately we have a well-rounded selection of levels rendered in many different PIGs in the Vertigo section, so meeting arbitrary quotas is not of utmost priority.

I've added annotations next to the Vertigo levels in the OP denoting which PIG they're using. If Metarock is Descent.PIG, it'll be 6 instances of it in the Vertigo portion, meaning no other level from it will be rendered using this palette. Let this be a suggestion for what types of levels we still require for Vertigo, and have them use their respective palettes. One more water level would still be nice to have, for example.

The fire PIG annotation blends with the author annotation.

Fixed. Meanwhile I've noticed that Temple of 42 is also in descent.pig, which would make 7 Vertigo levels using that palette. It's a distinctly Baloris-style level, so what would you say if we actually went with Alien1 for it? I know I said myself we shouldn't really follow quotas, but it's stronger than me

All I know is that the final level of the game has gotta be kinda like D1L12 or 26 (though not restricted to d1-only textures, obviously) so it totally needs that particular palette. This level wouldn't look bad at all with Alien1, though I appreciate deliberately choosing it for artistic reasons

I guess that's ok... the real reason I went with all D2 textures for 42 was that they would look a little different in descent.pig.
I'm just leery of adding new ones since I was very painstaking in making sure everything fit together.

Xfing wrote: ↑Sat Mar 31, 2018 3:02 am There are light blue textures to use though, no idea why you went with the pistacchio-cream

rock022
rock330
rock334
rock345

Pick your poison

However, this area does seem a bit cube heavy and apart from the pretty geometry, nothing appears to be going on in it, it's not very interactive either. At least a central pillar or two could spice things up.

I'm working with a Puuma Sphere level, 31, so I figured I couldn't use blue. But it's all a work in progress none the less!

Puuma sphere uses blue. Well, it comes off as teal but the textures are technically blue textures.
Look at the big room on level 22.

Alter-Fox wrote: ↑Sun Apr 01, 2018 9:47 am Puuma sphere uses blue. Well, it comes off as teal but the textures are technically blue textures.
Look at the big room on level 22.

We've been through that. It's a teal texture that looks blue in Water.PIG, no more, no less. Most teal textures lean towards pure blue in that palette.

Kaizerwolf wrote: ↑Sun Apr 01, 2018 9:12 am I'm working with a Puuma Sphere level, 31, so I figured I couldn't use blue. But it's all a work in progress none the less!

Ohhhh right! Didn't think about that. In that case yeah, better stick to pistacchio and cream

Xfing wrote: ↑Sun Apr 01, 2018 9:48 am We've been through that. It's a teal texture that looks blue in Water.PIG, no more, no less. Most teal textures lean towards pure blue in that palette.

And most blue textures look teal-ish in Alien2. What I mean to say is, it's blue the first time you see it in the game. So from the player perspective it's a blue texture.
There's also those bluish-grey rock textures that are used in all the systems.

Puuma Sphere has more colours than green and white if you look closely. Especially if you take Descent Maximum as also canon since it was arguably textured better especially in the last third of the game.

I was thinking about midi tracks recently since Sirius mentioned to me he wanted the level 14 track from D1 on Glacierspire. I know the idea in the back of (some of) our minds was to put it in Frosted Minerals but after playing Glacierspire I do kinda like it better there.
What do you think of using D1 level 9 for level 36? A nice creepy plodding track for a nice creepy plodding boss.

I'd probably switch the two - I can see D1L9 working quite well in Glacier.

When I replayed Metarock yesterday it actually had the level 14 track in it, if memory serves, so that would be the second level that uses that midi track. We'll think about it!

As for Alien1, I wonder if it makes textures greener, or whether it just properly displays those that are supposed to be green in the first place. The effect is the same in the end, but one still has to wonder. GroupA is the palette that gives some random textures an almost exclusively teal tint. Speaking of palettes, what do you think about giving level 42 Alien 1 and Metarock descent.pig? I think these would be good choices.

I think 42 could work with GroupA, Fire, or Alien1 honestly.
There are a bunch of brimspark-type textures in the level as well as the baloris ones.

Alien 1 doesn't screw too much with Brimspark textures, if at all. It only removes the depth from that one Martian texture that's used in Metarock (which is why I'd change it to descent.pig, honestly), and apart from d1.pig, only Fire.pig displays it properly.

Ok, I've made those changes and updated Dropbox. Should be alright now.

I compared the two for 42... Fire gives some of the green and whitish textures in there a darker tint which is interesting to see if nothing else.

As for LW's music comment -- I'd like to be able to go with the author's choice of song when they've made one, and I think the level 9 track works better for Frosted Minerals than it does for Glacierspire or Planetary Life. That would leave the D1 level 12 track for Planetary Life, which is the only other one I can think of that would really complement that map's darkness and overall tone.

EDIT: Have been checking out Metarock Lightwolf and your populating skills are getting better save for two things -- the first big dark and brown room is completely luck-based with the mix of cloaked lifters and gauss bots 'cause as soon as you're pinned down by one of the cloaked guys on hotshot or above you're toast, you can't see them to avoid them, and you're not given enough homing missiles to take out the snipers before you go in. Fix one of those three things -- if I were you I'd lower the number of cloaked bots in that room to two or three instead of a dozen. Keep the threat there -- it's a cool idea -- but make it fair.
The other thing is ammo. Your robot population is really nice but you need to give players either enough energy or enough vulcan ammo to deal with them. You've done neither.
By all means keep the amount low if that's how you want this to play, but include *some*. If you do want it to be a drought level I'd suggest focusing on the vulcan ammo over the energy, as the darkness is going to ensure that the player runs low on energy from flares.

And put in a headlight! This is the perfect level for players to actually use it!

Ok, one more thing.
Putting the reactor within line of sight of the red door can make the whole climax of the level easier than you meant it to be. Notice that Parallax rarely ever do this. Or other designers for that matter -- I can't actually think of an example of a level that did put it in sight of the door.
When you've got two red doors and you absolutely must put it within line of sight of one make it the one that's farther from the exit.

'Nother edit:
I've finally found high-res versions of the D1 door lights. Doesn't matter to you guys but it does for my version conversion. Haven't found any versions of the purple rocks but I found some purply alien looking rocks I can use as a placeholder for the meantime. I wonder if Pumo has anything...

Ok, I marked these two songs for their titles. Personally I think level 9's song is a bit too low-key for what's supposed to be the ultimate level of the Counterstrike portion, but whatever

As for palettes, let's keep in mind that they can serve as suggestions for what types of levels we need for the Vertigo portion so that it has decent enough variety. The Solar System portion is shaping up to have good variety, the CS portion will have it on principle, but what sorts of levels are we still missing for the Vertigo set? Indeed we could use one fire level and one water level, going by the palette annotations I've made. Of course they don't need to be textbook-style like the ones from Counterstrike, but something like Archangel Falls Mine or an approximation would be nice to have for Vertigo, since the only real water-based level it has at the moment is Dacol Futyl. We've also swerved considerably towards industrial and lab-like D1-style environments compared to actual Vertigo, so it would be nice to make a couple more traditional levels now to balance it out, I guess.

Still, I want at least one more level that goes totally ham on the white lab-like textures. We do have one such level with Haumea, but it would be nice to have one more. I'm thinking Orcus - make it half lab and half a new theme out of traditional D1 textures. Orcus is considered by many to be the "Anti-Pluto", since it has a very similar orbit to Pluto with the same resonance, but leaning in the opposite direction. The opposite of purple (the Plutonian color) is orange, but Sedna is already orange/red, so I'd probably go with something a bit different, no idea yet.