Why Map?
Why
should you map, and more importantly, why should you map using Portal©'s Cartographer? There are
some really good reasons, including:
·
You
know your way around the place now, but you won't always remember how to get
around so easily. A map makes it easier
to come back after a hiatus
·
In
big areas, there's almost no way you can learn the place by heart, and a map
keeps you from getting lost
·
Portal©
maps can be printed out, which makes them just as useful as maps made some
other way
·
Portal©
maps can be used to sprint from place to place once they're finished, making
for really easy travel
·
Portal©
maps can create traveling aliases or macros with a few simple mouse clicks, so
you don't even have to have the maps open
Setting Up the Charting Parameters
Before
you start charting, make sure the set up of the cartographer's charting
parameters is correct. Look at the room you're in. How are the exits set up? Most of the time, it will be something like
"(s, n, w)" in brief and "There are three obvious exits: south,
north, west" Also, try going in a
direction that doesn't exist, and see what message you get (e.g. "You
cannot go north.").
Type
Ctrl+Shift+G to bring up the cartographer and the Setup button (it's
on the top bar with the colorful geometric shapes).
Now, in the
failures section, put in part of the string you get when you can't go in a
certain direction, such as "You cannot go" (note that there is no
period). In the exit stubs
section, put
in "({@})" in the first line and "obvious exi*: {@}" in the
second. Use the * to account for
“obvious exits: “ and “obvious exit: “ (for one exit). As the Exit Stub List Separation Character,
use a single comma.
How Do You Map?
Mapping
with Portal© is a piece of cake. Let's
consider an area which looks like this:
1
\
2 - 3 4
| | /
5 - 6 - 7 - 8
| | |
9 - 10- 11- 12
|
13- 14 15 16- 17
\ | | | |
18 19 20- 21
| / \ |
22 23
Now,
assume room 1 is the entrance to the area.
How do we do the mapping thing?
On the
cartographer, using the file menu, create a new map level---let's call it TEST.
Now,
look on the cartographer top toolbar again and you'll see a sextant symbol on the second line
of buttons (if you don’t know what a sextant is, it’s the yellow mechanical-compass-looking thing). Ordinarily, you would click it.
Select the map TEST and go ahead and let it use 0,0 as the starting
coordinates. In this case, though,
since you're not really in the area we showed up above, don't do anything. Just follow along with me, perhaps trying out
some of the stuff to see what happens.
Now,
I'm assuming you're in room 1. Type se
or hit the 3 key on your keypad to move southeast. When you do, the cartographer brings up a screen. Normally you can just hit enter and go on
about your business. We'll talk about
when you might want to change some stuff in just a minute...
The
cartographer will wait for a few seconds before actually adding the room. During that time, the
black square in the top toolbar will turn red and begin to
count down. The small display to the
left of the counter it will show the "exit stubs" or half-links to
the other rooms (in our example, it would show lines pointing northwest, east,
and south). If you don't feel like
waiting the full timer delay, you can hit the enter key and force the addition
of the room to the map.
There
is an exception to the five second rule-if you used the “Complete Chart
When Exit Stubs Grabbed” in the charter set up options, as soon as you enter
the room it will add the room to the map.
This is good if you have a fast link and don’t feel like waiting every
time you enter a new room.
Want
to see what you've done so far? You'll see two
boxes joined by a diagonal line, and the lower box will have two half lines
going east and south. The half-lines
are exit stubs, showing you where you haven't been yet. The full lines are links between rooms. There will also be a big green X on the
lower of the two rooms, which shows your current location.
That's
really all there is to it. All you have
to do in our example is go through each room's exit, step by step, and the
cartographer will take care of the rest.
Prettying
up Your Map
Let's
say that room 15 in our example has a door that has to be opened before you can
get to room 19. If you were in room 15
and wanted the Charter to know about the door, you'd hit the 2 key on your
keypad or type s or south just like you ordinarily would. However, now's when we get to play with some
of the other fields in the window that comes up after you try to move while
charting.
See
that field marked "Pre-action" in the upper right? This is where you'd stick in "open
door" so that the cartographer knows there's a door there. If you're the kind who likes to shut doors
behind you, you could put "close door" in the post action field. So what, you might ask, does this do? Well, now when you make aliases/macros or
use the map to sprint, Portal© knows to stick in the command "open
door" before trying to move out of room 15 and into room 19. Pretty neat, eh?
That's
just the beginning of Portal©'s tricks, though. Let's say that room 16 has a trap which drops you down two levels
into a place full of aggressive monsters.
Let's say further that room 17 has a set of stairs down, and room 13 has
a set of stairs up, room 14 has a pub, and room 21 has a shop. You can make note of all these things on
your map without a whole lot of trouble.
Go to
the cartographer and look at your completed map. Right click on the room that represents room 16, and it brings up
a mini-menu. Pick the Room Properties
menu item. We'll be spending some time
here, since it allows a lot of map customization.
Room
16 is the one with the trap/false floor.
We probably want to do two things to this map room: fix it so that we
can see, at a glance, that there's a trap there, and fix it so that Portal©
itself doesn't sprint through the room or use it for macros without
warning. This is actually pretty easy
to do: we can use the tag T for trap, which will cause a T to show up
inside the room box. There's something
else we can do as well, but before you hit save, let's take care of the
alias/sprint issue. In the warning
field, type something like "The false floor here drops you two levels
down."
So,
what has this done? If you hit save,
you'll see that the room now has a T in it. The warning's effects are more subtle, but basically if you try
to sprint, if the path leads through the room, the sprint will stop before you
get there and tell you the warning.
There's
another way you can make this room stand out, too. Look at the cartographer's right panel, where you can see a row
of colors. Let's say you want the trap
room to stand out even more, like maybe in red. That's easy enough to do; right click the red box to make your
foreground room turn red. You could
also hit the asterisk button, though that would obscure the T by putting an
asterisk in the room. At any rate, when
you have the room parameters set to your satisfaction, just click on the Save
button. The room will then be updated
to the way you’ve set it.
Identifying
the shop and pub can be done the same way as identifying the trap room. You could use tags, S and P, to indicate
shops and pubs, but you could do anything else you wanted to as well. One really nifty thing is the label part of
the room properties dialog box. You
could enter shop and pub for the respective rooms and the labels "shop"
and "pub" would appear under the proper rooms on the map.
On the
rooms with up and down exits, I usually use the up arrow and down arrow inside
the box for the room, which is an easily visible means of identifying the
rooms, but again, you could do whatever works best for you.
Sprinting
and Aliases
Okay,
we have a nice pretty map. How do we
use it? Let's say you're in room one
and you want to get to the stairs down in room 17. Right click on room 1, and set it as the current location. That moves the big green X to room one...Now
click the button to the right of the sextant to turn on "following" mode. This is used when you want the cartographer to
"follow" you as you move around.
Now,
right click on the destination room, in this case room 17. You can choose one of two options. You can either sprint directly to the room
using the right-click menu, or you can choose to create a macro or alias. It's pretty self-explanatory when you try
it.
Pretty
simple huh? It makes life a lot easier
if you take the time to map.
Multilevel
Maps (Up/Down directions)
PortalÓ can also do maps with multiple levels; you don’t
have to keep each level on its own map.
The trick lies in selecting a new spot on the map so that the new level
won’t overlap with the old. The
procedure is simple enough; the up or down exits will bring up the room dialog
box, as will any movement. However, the
cartographer will not automatically know where to place the new room. You’ll have to show it where to put it using
the dialog box in the section in the lower right corner called “Add/Update
DESTINATION Room.” For the X, Y
coordinates, simple select a value that will offset the next floor far enough
that it won’t overlap. A link in the
form of a long line will join the two levels, and PortalÓ will be able to do sprinting and macros using the up
and down exits just like it can on any ordinary map.
Advanced
Mapping Techniques
Let's
say you don't want to see the cartographer's messages. There's a way to disable them by unchecking the appropriate menu
item in the cartographer's charting menu. The failure counter will still
work, as will the exit stubs, but you won't see any of the messages.
Well,
you say, what if I want to just move along without bothering with the dialog
box when I move? Check the speed-charting menu
item in the same menu and the cartographer will just use the default possibilities.
Finally, check out the free-charting option. This will eliminate failure counters. You lose the exit stubs, but it's a super fast way to chart if you already know the area well. This is great to use offline as well.
Conclusion
You
can probably see that Portal©’s cartographer has many features
that will make your MUD life much simpler.
Once you've used it a bit, you’ll find even more hidden surprises and
shortcuts that make cartography a breeze.