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[Daki]

Greeting,my fellow dwarves!
I have several questions regarding character,graphic sets and um...well,some mods
I grew bored with the game recently,so i set out to try some new mods. I installed both civilization forge and legendary lands,but the problem with those is that they either conflict with my graphic packs,or my graphic pack shows some very funky tiles.
Therefore,I have several questions:
1)I've seen people use both character sets and graphic sets (such as curses_16x16 and mike mayday's pack together). How is this possible?
2)What mod would you recommend I install,and what graphic set to go with it?
Cheers!

[Rochndil]

Good morning.

As you may have surmised, this is a pretty complicated area. The wiki http://www.dwarffortresswiki.net/index.php/Tilesets is a good source of help here, as with most things DF-related.

If you started doing this stuff manually (which is highly recommended), it can be fairly straightforward (if somewhat tedious) to figure out what's causing the problem. On the other hand, if you let automatic installers do the work, things can get messy quickly.

In general, there are four areas related to display in DF.

1. The data/art folder holds your character sets (what's used for text and most other display elements).

2. The init.txt file (in the init folder) controls WHICH character set you are using for each display mode (there are 4). The init.txt file also controls whether you are using graphics, or only characters.

3. /raw/graphics contains the definition files for any creature/sapient graphics you are using. The actual graphic files referenced in 3 above are generally stored in sub-folders under /raw/graphics (like /raw/graphics/creature).

4. /raw/objects controls how many (but not all) in-game items (such as creatures, plants, etc.) are displayed.

As you can see, there are quite few settings and files involved, and it can be very easy to cross the wires and have the wrong data referenced in one or more of the files.

Since not all character sets have the tiles in the same order, for example, changing from one character set to another may cause total havoc in your display.

Virtually all mods can be made to "play nice" with each other, but the process can require a good deal of tweaking. I personally play with MANY mods together, and after several rounds of tweaking I think I've got all the major bugs squished...the ones I've found at the least.

To get things working right, it is essential to determine exactly what files are added/changed by each of your mods. With that knowledge in hand, you can determine where they are conflicting, and make the necessary adjustments. In most cases this is pretty easy, but if two mods BOTH overhaul, for example, the tree character settings, you'll have to manually adjust the data before it will work properly.

Specific recommendations are highly personal. I personally prefer the classic Dystopian Rhetoric graphics and a fairly low-impact character set (Flying Mage or Shadow Lord). Others prefer Mayday and/or Sphr and its descendants (like Ranting Rodent, arguably the most complete graphics set going).

The easiest way to figure out which is best for you is to create a number of different DF copies that are all identical EXCEPT for the character set/graphics you have installed on each. Then, gen up a world, start a game, and get it to a point where you have a decently-sized fortress finished. Take that save game and open it up in each different copy to see how they all look with the same environment. Choose the one you like, and delete the rest.

Of course, by that point you may be wanting to make your own character/graphic sets, since you can't find JUST the one you want. Welcome to DF.

Rochndil, working on a character set right now...

[Daki]

Thanks for the heads-up.
I've been toying around with the settings for the past 2 hours,and I found out what I've been wanting to know:
If I want to use both graphic and character sets at the same time,I'm supposed to change the default font in init.txt,like so:

Code: [Select]

[WINDOWEDX:1280]
[WINDOWEDY:800]
[FONT:Flying_Mage.bmp]Install the graphic pack in raw/graphics,but leave
[GRAPHICS:NO] in init.txt.
Is this correct?

Also,yes,I'm using Quantas+Flying Mage too 

EDIT:Err,disregard that....still have no clue as to what to write in init.txt and manage to start both character and graphic set at the
same time
EDIT2:Ok,got it working... ><
So,i have to turn on graphics,but with the character set for font,and the icons will be whatever i got in raw/graphics?

[Rochndil]

Close.

The character set is the baseline, ie EVERYTHING is drawn using that by default. Then, IF you have Graphics turned on and IF you have graphics and descriptor files for them, creatures (including races) can have sprites instead of characters.

The other way to look at it is that any creatures that have the necessary stuff (graphics and control/definition files) have sprites, and EVERYTHING ELSE comes from your character set.

What gets confusing is that stuff from the character set can LOOK like sprite graphics. And, you can do things with the character set that cannot be done with actual graphics, like making vermin individualized (see Belal's set for example).

Rochndil, who will probably throw a few vermin into his character set...

[Daki]

Whew,finally managed to get it working...hopefully 
So,I'm playing with belal's set and dystopian quantas,along with civilization forge installed...i hope nothing will conflict with anything!

[Rochndil]

Remember, the errorlog.txt file is your best friend. Anything seriously wrong will spawn an entry there. Failing that. you can always do a text-search through your raws to see where something is being defined, and fix it if necessary.

Rochndil, who spent a lot of time tweaking entities and creatures, and has more to do yet...

[Shoku]

The onyl conflicts you'll ever see will be things in the objects or graphics folders. With graphics you need to make sure that the txt files don't reference the same kind of unit multiple times and with objects you need to make sure that there aren't multiple copies of the same unit.

If you aren't trying to mix graphics packs you won't have any trouble with the graphics folder.

In the objects folder a common duplicate is the warg entry. You can just delete one or if you want to keep both around you could change the first line [CREATURE:WARG] to [CREATURE:WARG2]. You don't need to worry about it showig up as warg2 in the game as the line right below that controls how it displays. [NAME:warg:wargs:warg]
Also if the tag [CHILDNAME:_:_s] is around that controls what the young are called.