Why do my lines keep disapearing after being saved
When I opened up CC3 today (Modern) I started drawing a new map of a mansion. For some reason some after I save it and reopen it, some of my lines keep disappearing. I cannot understand why. I did a repair and that did not correct the problem. The settings I have on the top are as follows:
S: Background
P:000mm
3.000
L: Wall Features
LS: Solid
FS: Hollow
Can someone give me an idea of why it is doing this and tell me how to avoid it. I'm a novice so my understanding is quite low. Please don't talk over my head with your response, keep it as simple as possible.
S: Background
P:000mm
3.000
L: Wall Features
LS: Solid
FS: Hollow
Can someone give me an idea of why it is doing this and tell me how to avoid it. I'm a novice so my understanding is quite low. Please don't talk over my head with your response, keep it as simple as possible.
Comments
If your wall sheet is above your floor sheet, for example, your walls will be drawn first, then your floors, and your floors may cover up your walls.
another possibility is that you have drawn your lines on the 'wrong' sheet, so that they are, again, covered up by something else... for example, if you accidentally drew your walls on the background sheet, then drew your floors on the floor sheet, your walls would disappear.
those are the two most common reasons I can think of, but it's hard to tell what's really going on without seeing the .fcw
Also when I start a new map and draw a simple square with individual lines, not all of the lines show up or only half of a line shows up. If I enlarge or decrease the screen size this seems to cause lines to disappear also.
I'm concerned about having this problem again (the lines disappearing) when I start a new building all together...like the servants and guards quarters.
What can I do to prevent this from happening?
What should my settings be at to prevent this.
I admit, I'm not even sure what it is you mean when you say the 'inside lines'. do you mean inner walls? Hopefully, someone with a lot more experience than I have will be able to help sort this out.
C:\Program Files(x86)\ProFantasy\CC3\Top Secret S.I.\Operation Arctic Blast\Chimera's Island, Mansion\Test Map.FCW
Is there some sort of "reset" button on CC3 to restore factory settings that I could try?
I could uninstall and reinstall the program and it might correct it, but won't I lose all my saved maps if I do that?
The most common reason why things seems to disappear is because you have drawn them on a sheet covered by another sheet. For performance reasons, everything you draw will appear on top of everything as you draw it, but once a map redraw happen for any reasons, things will be drawn correctly based upon their sheet which may make it look like things disappear, because it is on a sheet that is covered by another.
This is further explained in the 'Sheets and Effects' chapter of the manual. Never save maps within the CC3 directory, Windows UAC virtualises these writes, so you can only see them from inside the program (because they are really being written to somewhere completely different), but you cannot find them form an explorer/browse window. I recommend just opening it in CC3, and use save as to save it somewhere else.
Ralf should be able to help you if you upload the .FCW file right here.
You can do that by clicking the browse button underneath a new comment as you write it, and locating the .FCW file, then clicking the 'Add your comments' button.
C:\Program Files(x86)\ProFantasy\CC3\Top Secret S.I.\Operation Arctic Blast\Chimera's Island, Mansion\Test Map.FCW
Is there some sort of "reset" button on CC3 to restore factory settings that I could try?
I could uninstall and reinstall the program and it might correct it, but won't I lose all my saved maps if I do that?
Try saving the FCW on your desktop from within CC3, and then upload it to the site.
You simply need to move your user files and folders out of the software folder system, which you will have to do manually with file explorer with the hidden system folders made visible to that you can see them.
I have all of my CC3 maps in a folder called "CC3 Maps" in my "Documents" folder. That might not be the recommended place (if there is one), but its a whole lot better than mixing user files with the actual software program files.
The gaps you see are where lines once were drawn. I tried several different maps and kept getting the same results. The lines that would disappear seemed very random.
The second map I posted "Chimera's Mansion, Main level, I did several days ago, and this doesn't seem to suffer the same problems.
What is the difference between the maps?
Sorry if I was a bit sharp, Cosmos! I was suddenly very anxious that you didn't go and uninstall everything when it wasn't necessary, and it wouldn't have solved the problem.
For reference, CC3+ split out all data from the program directory, so with CC3+ it is safe to save in the data directory (although I still recommend using your documents directory instead), but with CC3, it is very important to use a different directory.
If that is where it directed you the first time you ever saved a map, I have no idea why it did that. Its such a long time ago that I did my first map that I can't remember where the default location was initially set.
Anyhow - you have it somewhere that isn't in the software folders, which is a much better situation.
You might want to move the folder with all your maps into the Documents folder, since there it will be alongside lots of other user file folders, and hopefully automatically included in any regular backups you do, without having to worry about anything.
Try moving the grid sheet higher up the list in the sheets manager (its upside down, remember).
One modified screen shot coming up.
First click the button on the left with three yellow square things on it (ringed in red and numbered 1)
This will open the 'Drawing sheets and effects' dialog
Select the GRID sheet numbered 2. (click on it so that it is highlighted)
Then using the 'Move up' button (ringed and numbered 3 in red), move the GRID sheet up the stack till it is above the FLOOR sheet (which is where all your lines have been drawn)
This might seem like an odd thing to do, but the representation of the sheets in your drawing (which are similar to layers in apps like GIMP or PS) is upside down. That is to say that sheet listed at the top of that list will be on the bottom of the drawing as it appears in your map window.
To understand more about what sheets do and how to use them, it might be a good move to look at that section of the User Manual where they are explained. The effects you can add to each sheet are the fun bit, but its best to take this one step at a time
An alternative to moving them at all is to hide the grid, by clicking the little box immediately to the left of the name of the GRID sheet so that you can see a little 'H' there.
So if you have land then sea sheets... the land will be drawn under the sea.
They should be:
Sea
Land
The sheets are drawn from the top of the list to the bottom of the sheet list. So Backgorund gets drawn first, map border gets drawn last.
You can also hide the Grid sheet. Its the second column in the shet popup. Click on it, next to Grid, and then click 'Redraw on Ok'. then click okay.
The gride will hide, and you can see your lines.
I just went back and checked and yes, that corrected the problem. You are awesome!
Never think there's only one right way of doing a thing, however. Like I said, you could just as easily hidden it, but by moving it you can now carry on drawing with it visible.
You might find watching Joseph Sweeneys videos helpful at this stage - the ones about drawing dungeons cover a lot of this stuff. You can get to them by opening the sticky thread at the top of the forum page called:
Interesting, Important and Helpful topics - Free Symbols, Resources, Tutorials & More
Click 'ProFantasy User Tutorials' in the list of tutorials in that thread to get to the right page