Creating Symbol Catalogs
I am trying to create a symbol catalog, but whenever I do and try to edit/move/copy/execute practically *any* command upon an entity, instead of the "Select entities:" prompt on the command line, I get "Layer [dialog]" instead. Help?!
Comments
To fix it, simply type SELBYD on CC3's command line (When it is ready for a new command, NOT when it displays the Layer [dialog] prompt).
Another way of fixing it is to go to Tools --> Options --> Select Method --> Dialog or Popup.
Sorpaw
Thanks,
Sorpaw
* Note that the directory you put these in should be one that doesn't change over time (Including changing drive letter). The best place is inside the CC3 directory, usually inside #Symbols\User\TheNameOfThisParticularCollection, because this allows you to use a relative path when importing, so the symbols will always work as long as they are in the same relative location to your CC3 installation directory, even if this is installed to wildly different locations over time or different computers.
It is good to know that cc2-compatible software is not for .png files. I prefer to use that CC2/CC2 Pro) when I can. Is there any such problem with .lmk files? (I am looking for Linda's good railroad track and ore cart symbols.) I have had real problems with the .lmk files - is there any reason for this?
Thanks for the thoughts,
Sorpaw
Thanks,
Sorpaw
If you provide the link to the page you downloaded them from, I could check.
I found the following website:
http://www.nightsaroundthetable.com/maps/closedsc.htm#LMK
Which has a link to the railroad symbol catalog:
http://www.nightsaroundthetable.com/dnldzip/Railroad_LMK.zip
That ZIP file contains the FSC file.
Note that I haven't tried this file, as I'm not at home right now.
I was drawing lots of entities for a catalog of symbols I planned to make, but had not yet saved them into individual symbols. (BIG mistake, apparently) I did, however save the file multiple times so I had the drawing, at least. But then I wanted to start a new file to experiment with something before going back to the first file, so I created a new symbol catalog file. I was presented with the "Do you want to save X", and I said no, and then proceeded to create the new file. (Symbol Catalog, Decide Settings myself, Blank Overland Catalog, etc). I wanted a white background with the catalog, but it gave me a dark green. Naturally, trying to Change Background Color did nothing, since "BACKGROUND is not a defined layer on this file type." Multiple retries to fix the problem failed. Now it seems no matter what I do, my background is *always* a dark green...
To make things worse, when I decided to give up and go back to the original file I was working on...I opened the file to find that all the entities were gone, and the background is now dark green! There goes hours and hours of work down the drain... I know it seems obvious that I overwrote the file somehow and saved it over my old file...but I *swear* I didn't do that. At this point I realize that all my hard work is probably lost forever, and all I want to do is start over with a symbol catalog with a white background...but it seems impossible for me to do even that!
I wish I could say that this was the first time this kind of thing has happened to me.
Every time I feel like I'm getting somewhere with CC3, I am awed by how powerful the program is (or could be), but then something terrible happens and I either lose all my work or some stubborn problem occurs that I can't fix and I throw my hands up in frustration. I've had this program for years, and have been upgrading all along the way. I want to love CC, but these little things continue to bite me. /end rant
Symbol Catalogs use a different view color to make them stand out from proper maps - but you can change that easily under View > View-Window Color. "Change Background Color is for changing the color an actual BACKGROUND layer in a map - which there isn't in a symbol catalog.
Thanks for pointing out the View->View-Window Color option. I will try that out. I knew that "Change Background Color" was wrong...but I didn't know what was right!
Thanks for your help.
Thanks,
Sorpaw
When importing an outside (meaning, it did not come with the mapping package) symbol or symbol catalog, what do you do, step by step? I have not had a great deal of success importing outside symbols, so I wonder whether it was my method...
Please let me know what method you use!
Sincerely,
Sorpaw
Note that if you open a .fsc symbol catalog file containing raster symbols, it is important that the accompanying .png files are located in the appropriate location on your hard drive, since the .fsc file contain pointers to these.
I have used RPTools’ TokenTool to generate round tokens with images of diverse characters. Simply because I don’t know how to get transparency into png-files, as I don’t own e.g. any software that allows me to do it. If CC3 has such a feature, too, I never found out how to do it.
So I have a couple of png files dropped into …\Symbols\User\Characters\
I then created a new file (Symbol Catalog, Decide Settings myself, Blank Dungeon Catalog, etc.) and saved it in the same place as Characters.fcw
I imported all the pngs (Symbol Manager, Import PNGs, relative to CC3 path).
I then saved all images as a catalog (Symbol Manager, mark all images, Save as Catalog) in the same folder under the name CharactersRaw.fsc
Still the drawing file (Characters.fcw) I placed the symbol from my new catalog.
I then adjusted the size (radius) of each to indicate the actual size-to-be in the applications I want later on in actual maps.
E.g. a human was set to have a radius dependent on the size of the particular human (5’10’’), a greater orc as 6’6’’ etc. etc. These were placed on the Symbol Definition Sheet.
I then went Define as Symbol (Symbols, Define Symbol), gave it the name “RMU” (prefix) and “Human Fighter 1”.
Did so with the rest of the adjusted images/symbols, too.
Finally I did (Symbol Manager, mark new images, Save as Catalog) again and saved as Characters.fsc, again in the same folder.
I then went over to a battlemap I created earlier and called the Characters.fsc.
Unfortunately, there are no tokens there at all. The name is there, all right, e.g. “RMUHuman Fighter 1”, but there is no image. And when placed on the drawing, also no symbol. It’s also not a matter of wrong size, no symbol was actually placed.
So, what is wrong ?
Instead of doing it like that, what you need to do in CharactersRaw.fsc is to open up symbol manager, select one symbol at a time, and hit the edit button, then rescale it in the symbol editor window.
Another option is to place the symbol, then explode it before rescaling and defining it again. Exploding a symbol turns it into its individual entities, and basically un-makes it as a symbol.
Thanks a lot.
Hmm.
It seems it would actually be quicker not to import the ongs in that case, but just open the pngs like a symbol catalog, place each png on the fcw file, scale and define.
I think
Anyway, many thanks.
Will try this asap