CC3 Lighting and Cave Walls

glanrock

Hello all,
I am in perhaps my second month of owning the software, and at the moment using the Dungeon Designer. First of all, the maps are awesome, I used the first creation with a D&D4E group and despite me missing the button that would have printed the map to scale 1" to 5' it looked so great it was small in comparison.

So on to my question. I am designing a small cave and have added torches to the walls and have been playing with the lighting for hours over the past few days. While unable to find the Global Sun, I am not worried, as the lights are showing up regardless. However even after consulting repeatedly the Help within the software, I find I must still be missing something. I can lighten, darken, and determine how far they project, but I was unable to tweak it enough to make it look "right" for lack of better terms.

This brings me to the second question. I've realized after drawing in the Fractal Cave Floors that technically there are no walls, which would explain why the lights pass right through the edges. I'm unsure how to add a wall to the edges of the fractal terrain. Searching Help topics but not finding anything relevant, yet I am sure there is a method. Hopefully the answers to the above are not glaringly obvious and I'm simply overlooking something right in front of me.

Thanks in advance for any help!

glanrock

So I've searched the forum and found what I did not know about, the manual located in the CC3 directory. While helpful, it is displaying data that my CC3 installation does not have. For example, the Wall Shadow, Point of LIght. I do not have the ability to Delete the Light, Add Light, etc and it doesn't look the same at all. Is that perhaps a screen shot of an older version? I have not successfully found how to delete an existing placed light source. I dropped one onto my map in error, and before I caught it, to Undo it and now I'm having trouble getting rid of it.

I have the v8 update installed. Is there perhaps something else to install?

Thanks in advance for any help! This is all new to me.

glanrock

I've noted and read the quote from 'mutant' and unfortunately I do not see how to do what he states. Right clicking seems to get me nowhere. If I could afford to keep buying more stuff I would, regarding the Ultimate Mapping book, and other posts about the "Annuals". I mean no disrespect, I simply can't afford it! :-)

Regardless, I keep plodding along, I think I'm slowly getting the hang of it. Though the lighting is still tricky, at least I've found enough info on the Forum here using the Searches for later when I can get back to the software to "play" again.

Still not sure what this below means...

Posted By: mutantI am assuming your floor is 1) made of a ploygon 2) on floor sheet and 3) background layer...

not sure if easiest, but my suggestion:

select floor -> right-click "copy" and choose "copy to layer"
copy to walls layer and walls sheet
hide floor sheet
select floor (now on walls sheet) -> click "change properties"
change line width to XXX (width you want), fill style to XXX (whatever you want)
use break and/or split on walls that block corridors.

One of the early annual issues (first year I believe) has a cave drawing issue which is awesome and may help you out as well.

sdavies2720

If you are right-clicking the copy button and nothing happens, your base CC3 installation is messed up. Right-clicking on that icon (it's one with four little blue boxes in it and some lines connecting them to the top-left box) gets me a menu that has 15 entries in it. "Copy to Layer" is about half-way down. Select that one then select the floor.

Let us know what's going on and we'll try to help. Mutant's shorthand is accurate, but assumes a lot of familiarity with CC3. We can expand his notes into step-by-step instructions if that will help.

Steve

glanrock

I see that button and, I had not used it yet. So I think my install is okay, thankfully. I see the 'copy to layer' and suddenly this makes sense! Thanks for your reply! Hopefully I can put that to use tonight.

Thanks again Steve!


John

glanrock

I've seen now where I simply need a lot more practice with the software. Despite my inability to figure this out, the map as it is now will work. Being able to print out a floor tile map instead of simply drawing it out in multi-color marker is too cool. The players will never know they were missing out on the neat shadowing affects I was going for.

John