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[Droggarth]

One thing I instantly noticed in the new 'Taffer' color scheme was the brighter black background, loving it! Not sure though what has changed exactly in the 'Arabic-inspired' one but seems to be easier to read. Overall, nice work!

[Taffer]

New release!

- Improved the mountain and volcano tiles for easier to read maps.
- Slightly darkened dark gray and light gray on the Pastel palette (the default). This was done for better contrast with the other colors.
- Removed the Dawnbringer colors.

[Taffer]

Another release? So soon? (Yes).

I sat down to actually play for once and I was immediately reminded that I hated the 'r' tile and that the shade of brown in my default palette was ugly. So I fixed both, redid the previews (again), and tweaked light cyan, dark cyan, light gray, and dark gray again for contrast and readability.

Here's hoping I can last more than 2 hours this time before trying again.

[Taffer]

Here's hoping I can last more than 2 hours this time before trying again.

24 hours this time. Lowercase 't' was bothering me as I was playing, so I fixed it up a little for sans-serif and arabic-inspired. The tileset really is much more readable than in my 10x10 days..

[Taffer]

Re: today's announcement

I have no interest in supporting my work anywhere outside of GitLab or the Bay12 forums. If it isn't posted by spiral-king on GitLab or by Taffer on the Bay 12 forums, then I didn't make it.

[Shonai_Dweller]

Woohoo. Sound and graphics and achievements and...
...
Ooh! Latest Taffer tileset! 

Steamwhatnow?

[Taffer]

Have a poorly drawn, hastily created mockup heavily inspired by Crazy 8x8! This isn't at all final or even WIP yet, it's just thrown together to give an idea of what I want. If it's not what you want, cool! Please let me know!

I didn't even do a good job at a mockup, because it doesn't show off beds, barrels, chests, and I didn't even throw a little arena fight in there to show that I'm not doing creature graphics. Please read the details below.
 


With the promise of better graphical support built into the game rather than as a hacky memory editing library, it looks like I'll finally be able to get a little fancy someday. The two rooms on the left are meant to be engraved.

Q: an old fashioned "church of ASCII" version?
A: yes.
Q:18x18 version?
A: yes, but not custom drawn. Doubled from the 9x9, just like I do now.
Q: fancy landscape tiles?
A: yes, if supported.
Q: tiny item tiles, like beds, barrels, wardrobes, screw pumps, stairs, and more?
A: yes, if supported.
Q: sexy graphical maps?
A: yes, if supported.
Q: arabic-inspired and cyrillic-inspired variants?
A: depends on the art style I end up with and how tedious it is to have them as options. If you think I'm doing separate tiles for anything but the font though, you're insane.
Q: custom workshops?
A: probably not, but maybe (if supported). I don't want to go crazy.
Q: straight wall variant?
A: see previous answer.
Q: serif font?
A: no.
Q: creature graphics?
A: definitely not, not 9x9. I'll probably drop support for dwarf graphics and stick with dorfletters.
Q: multiple z-level view (see the z-layer below you)
A: if supported and if I can do it in a way that doesn't look terrible.
Q: rectangular menu font?
A: heresy maybe.

This is all speculation. I'll believe things when Toady releases them. Until then I'll see what I can do to quietly prepare. Don't hesitate to ask questions below.

[Shonai_Dweller]

Would you consider a whole alphabet of "dorfletters" (assuming new capabilities are bringing in multiple/big tileset support)?

I far prefer these to smiley-faces, but come Mythgen (and certain current mods) we're likely to be faced with dwarfless sites of procgen subterranean hippo people rather than dwarves. Leaving us with a choice of dorf-d, normal 'h' or back to smilies.

[Taffer]

Would you consider a whole alphabet of "dorfletters" (assuming new capabilities are bringing in multiple/big tileset support)?

I far prefer these to smiley-faces, but come Mythgen (and certain current mods) we're likely to be faced with dwarfless sites of procen subterranean hippo people rather than dwarves. Leaving us with a choice of dorf-d, normal 'h' or back to smilies.

Sure, when it becomes necessary. It might not be a bad idea to give goblins, humans, elves, and kobolds special letters at first. I'll see what works.

[Rose]

By that time, DF will have full graphics support, so maybe a new 9x9 set based on that?

[Taffer]

By that time, DF will have full graphics support, so maybe a new 9x9 set based on that?

I'll be making a 9x9 graphics set, yeah. Probably just in the same thread, though. I've been using it for 7 years so far, no point in stopping now.

[Taffer]

I took some of the criticism to heart and I thought I'd post a new mockup.



Please speak up if you have anything to say. That's the only reason I even post the mockups. The rooms to the left are still engraved, and this time I've thrown in a bunch of dwarves, elves, kobolds, goblins, and humans to brawl and show off their new letters. Also, RIP diagonal walls. I'm happy to keep them but then the whole thing would have to tilt more towards ASCII: I can't have busy floor tiles with diagonal walls without leaving obvious gaps, and I can't have busy ground tiles IMO if I don't have busy floor tiles. Maybe a shift closer to ASCII (what I have for download now) is a good thing, though. Who knows, you tell me.

The engraved walls probably don't stand out enough, but maybe that's a feature.

Maybe 9x9 is too small for you, though.



And for the "mockups are useless, get off my lawn" crowd, have the two tilesets used to stitch together the mockup.



Keen observers will probably notice new stair, barrel, switch, hill, and trap graphics. The hills are terrible, though. Just note that there's a reason my tilesets weren't this way from the beginning, you'll have all kinds of stupid looking weirdness in places you don't expect it. Enjoy the magical barrel-shifting screw pumps.

[CLA]

These pillars and smooth walls are surprisingly gorgeous!

Please speak up if you have anything to say. That's the only reason I even post the mockups.

I'm always happy to see your work in progress. Really inspiring and shows how much effort you put into the tileset.
I think the grass is definitely an improvement in terms of contrast and noise. Although it seems surprisingly organic (i.e. round) compared to your general style. Not saying that's necessarily a bad thing, just an observation. Tree/grass contrast is good enough considering how it's not that important.

Engraved walls are very subtle, not sure if that's my thing; I really liked the engraving you had in the mockup before (both walls and floor). It looks very unique and a very good fit to how your style evolved. Have you tried that kind of engraved wall design with orthogonal walls?.
The non-engraved floor in that mockup irritated me however. It tiles in a bad way. That is, it looks like it isn't supposed to tile, but it glaringly is. With the current-mockup non-engraved floor it shows that it's tiling, but it looks like it's on purpose and while obvious it doesn't steal focus.
The tile design itself is great, but it's a bit too low contrast with the walls for my tastes.
Looks like it's kinda difficult to distinguish between up, down and up/down stairs.
In general, the single-pixel patterns you started with the arabic-looking font had some very interesting and beautiful results as long as they stayed subtle and out of focus. the "+" floors with single pixel corners for example looked very good. Sometimes, they become too prominent and it becomes difficult to see the actual symbol; I think that's when they can turn from a very interesting style to a "legibility" issue.


tl;dr:
I'd make the non-engraved floor appear bit darker and play around some more with engravings.

[Iliithid]

Going to echo CLA here vis a vis engravings, I loved the first mockup, it's exactly what I've been hoping for. I'm also obsessed with the initial concept for grass/plant graphics, though the new floors are better. Maybe some sort of compromise? Keep in mind I'm no designer, just an avid player. A lot of my suggestions CLA has already basically covered when it comes to shading or what have you.

[August]

Hi Taffer, I just wanted to start off by saying that I love your tilesets a ton. I've been using your Traditional set for years, probably since around 2015.
Anyways, I wanted to know your policy on modifying/using your tilesets outside of DF. I've started playing around with making a simple ascii game using SadConsole, just a small hobby project that I'll put up on Github at some point.
Sadconsole supports custom tilesets in a similar way to DF, and I would love to use your Traditional set as one of the visual style options. I looked at your Gitlab repository but you don't have a license attached. Are the Taffer sets Copyleft? I would of course give you full attribution. Thanks for the info.