Opening CC2 in CC3
Hello, I recently received a file from a friend, which he says was created using CC2. Now, I run CC3+ and I didn't think there would be an issue with the file.
But, when I open it,there is no coloring, and all of the symbols or images are different sized letters instead. The rivers are blue lines, and the city names are still there, but nothing else seems to have opened right. Is there any way to fix this? Is this a common problem? Thanks!
But, when I open it,there is no coloring, and all of the symbols or images are different sized letters instead. The rivers are blue lines, and the city names are still there, but nothing else seems to have opened right. Is there any way to fix this? Is this a common problem? Thanks!
Comments
You can try to convert the file (found in the File menu), but from your description, that doesn't seem to be the issue, as unconverted files should normally open fine.
I assume the file is indeed a .fcw file, and not exported from CC2 to another format?
Do you have access to CC2, if so, have you tried to open it there to check that the file works fine there?
Mind sharing the file? Me or someone else could have a look at it to see if maybe we could figure out what is wrong. (You can share it privately with me by using the whisper feature if you for some reason doesn't want it posted publically)
I'll try and look at it, but my time is limited. So go ahead and attach the fcw file to a post.
Sadly I don't personally have access to CC2, only the person who made it. But he tells me that it opens fine in CC2. I have the map because I'm working on some other stuff for the group and need the full map, but also because I have CC3+ and was offering to edit it as some thing have changed in the world since this version was created.
I've attached the file, thanks for your help!
(Click to see a higher-resolution version.)
Unfortunately, if it is from CC-DOS, I don't know how to make it show up correctly. Maybe somehow obtaining and installing the SYMBOL2.FNT font might do it? Or maybe there's a way to replace the different text "symbols" with symbols from a catalog? I don't know. Hopefully someone smarter than me can provide a working solution.
Good luck!
~Dogtag
~Dogtag
This map does use fonts for symbols, the old CC-DOS style, but it's not a CC-DOS map (File extension is wrong, and even if I rename it, CC-DOS fails to load it.)
As Dogtag pointed out, the symbols are really text entities, using the SYMBOL2.FNT font. For some reason, this font file doesn't seem to be distributed with CC3, but it is available in CC3+, however, even if CC3+ had the font, it failed to load the map properly. I suspect that since this is a feature not really used anymore, there is a bug when attempting to load these .fnt files from the new CC3 + data directory. However, what I did was to copy this font file from my CC3+ data directory to my CC3 installation directory, and then open the map in CC3. (The file can also be found in the CC2 installation directory) This caused all the symbols to show properly. I don't know why this file isn't in CC3 in the first place though (Although it is only useful to be able to load legacy maps like this, nobody should use it in a modern map)
You also mention coloring. Old CC-DOS maps (which this clearly originated from originally, even if the current incarnation is not such a map) didn't use to have background coloring, and I couldn't find any indication in this map that there are supposed to be any either. Do you know that there should be some?
Since there seems like there might be a bug in CC3+ regarding the loading of .FNT files I suggest you use CC3 for this map for now, just remember to copy over the font file.
Since this map is based on such old and outdated features, I would suggest recreating it in a more modern version of CC. I don't think there is an easy way to do a straight conversion from text to symbols however, so unless Ralf has an idea, it is probably going to be a manual process for the symbols. Coastlines, rivers and such should be copyable to a new map directly however.
I'm not sure how you would tell what package they came from. I think it assumes that they were made with Pro and you are asked to choose what to convert them to, but I've never had a problem converting anything. The sheets do need reordered and cleaned up, but it all works just fine otherwise.
JimP - I have also seen old,simple maps from earlier times. Unfortunately, this was not so simple.
If it doesn't have sheets, its before CC3. The symbols are plainer to. And when I go to load a symbol set in CC2, the lower right says 'FastCAD Symbol Catalog'.
I'm wondering, could it be from Campaign Mapper that was part of the Core Rules 2? I know that it was a bit different than Campaign Cartographer, though I'll confess to not being sure how different. I had only used CM for a couple of days after which my husband quickly ordered CC2 as an anniversary gift. I still have the CM symbols and lovingly copy them into each version of CC that comes along.