A New Sub-domain
by Jason Otto on Oct.05, 2013, under Site Updates
I’ve added the sub-domain brewing.jasonotto.net for my home brewing activities. I’m also considering splitting my Thief pages off into thief.jasonotto.net. The trick will be to not break any permalinks. If you came here looking for beer making information click the link above.
New Tutorial – Convert World Rep to Model
by Jason Otto on Oct.04, 2012, under DromEd
Newest, and most powerful feature in DromEd 1.19, the ability to export the world rep to a model. This powerful ability allows any architecture to become a static mesh.
DromEd 1.19 Fixes
by Jason Otto on Oct.02, 2012, under DromEd
The mysterious author of DromEd 1.19 based the build on the DromEd Tool Kit .cmd files. These files are needed for many of the menu items to operate correctly. Download Here DromEd Tool Kit Home
Also, the shipped version of DromEd 1.19 did not correctly calculate object shadows from objects. A patch already exists for that problem. Download Here
Thief 2: The Metal Age Updated to Version 1.19
by Jason Otto on Sep.27, 2012, under Patches
This file appeared online a few days ago on the french forum Ariane4ever, “Le Corbeau” posted these patches out of nowhere. DrK brought them to the attention of the community at TTLG.
Before beginning, I discovered you must have an up to date version of DirectX. Get that here
This is an unofficial patch for Thief II: The Metal Age (T2) which updates the game from v1.18 to v1.19, providing improved support for modern hardware and correcting many known bugs. T2 can be purchased digitally from GOG (www.gog.com) and Steam (store.steampowered.com). If you prefer a boxed copy, it can usually be found on Mastertronic and Amazon (or similar).
…
A small sample of changes and fixes
———————————–
Renderer:
- Added windowed mode
- Added single display mode option – no resolution change between menus and game
- Added ingame support for all common resolutions, including widescreen
- Added support for 32-bit color
- Textures can now be automatically promoted to 32-bit, improving quality and effectively eliminating the palette limit
- Added UI framerate cap option to avoid GPU fan spinning up in UI
- Added DDS/PNG image support
- Added full 24/32-bit TGA/BMP image support
- Increased the maximum number of frames allowed in animated textures from 20 to 99, and increased the allowable filename length for animated textures (before the underscore) to support more than 7
- Animated texture rate can now be specified via a material file for that texture
- Fixed a bug where Transparency property didn’t (correctly) apply on objects that contain transparent polys
General:
- Replaced video player lib with an FFMpeg based one to play cutscenes. LGVid.ax or other codecs are no longer required
- Option to use OpenAL (if available) instead of DirectSound. Includes support for audio effects in Windows 7 without an EAX-enabled driver (e.g. ALchemy)
- Added “head_bob” config var to control amount of head bob
- Added mousewheel support to options menu
- Fixed player ground contact tracking when walking off an object (caused footstep sounds to get “stuck” on previous material)
- Fixed sound cap per schema type bug and upped max sound channels to 48
- Changed screenshot output format to BMP and also added support for PNG screenshots
- Changed mouselook sensitivity to be resolution independent
- Added check to avoid trying to open files with reserved system name like com ports
- AIs now breathe from their head instead of their stomachs. They will no longer drown when up to their waist in water.
- Lowered player crouch height by a tiny fraction so he’s less likely to get stuck on 4 unit tall spaces
- Added better support for binding actions to the mouse wheel (can bind wheel up and wheel down as separate actions, with modifier key support)
- Fixed star rendering
- Added “log_player_pos” command that dumps current player pos to log file (when enabled)
- Added the ability to detach from ladders by crouching
- Improved mantling a bit and added optional new mantling algorithm with lower failure rate
- Fixed a bug which limited number of sound channels to 16 even if more were selected
- Fixed a bug that sometimes caused doors to float away into infinity
- Fixed (or at least greatly improved) a bug with edge triggered OBBs sometimes failing to detect collision (in particular for slow moving objects)
- Fixed framerate dependent speed issue for camvators/moving terrain (with collision type: none)
- Added “fixed_star_size” option for resolution independent star size
- Fixed some bugs when attaching to a ladder from water.
- AIs who are facing very close to a wall will no longer turn to face south when the game begins
- Health bar drawing adjusted in widescreen
- Added option to fix arm rendering
- Added AA to rendering of loadout screen items
- Fixed pickpocket count bug that would always show 1 more maximum pickpocket than there actually was.
- Added “Blocks frobs” property, allowing objects to block frobs of objects behind them (e.g. to stop frobbing items through safe doors)
- Added option to left-align map notes text
- Made navigation of map/objectives screen a little bit more in-game friendly (screen can also be closed with space, arrow key navigation and return to switch map/obj)
DromEd:
- Lightmaps are now properly displayed in the editor 3D view
- Added support for HW rendering in editor viewports
- Increased the maximum number of visible on-screen terrain polies from 1024 to 20480
- Increased the maximum number of visible on-screen objects from 128 to 1280
- Added some safety checks to object scaling operations to prevent objects with 1.#INF scale
- Fixed a crash when computing pathfinding with an improperly linked moving terrain object in the mission. An ignorable assert is thrown and the object is skipped gracefully instead of crashing.
- Prevented a crash if you apply a model of one creature type to an object assigned a different creature type
- Fixed “Attempt to mark from invalid room id 0″ assertion to actually show the room id that is invalid, instead of always showing 0.
- Integrated csgmerge tool into editor exe
- Added support for 32-bit lightmaps
- Fixed the bug where cloning a multibrush with particles would duplicate every object in the mission
- Fixed a bug where the game would crash when deleting a large multibrush
- Added fallback check to find Motiondb.bin in resource paths
- Fixed resource lock errors when loading TGA images (for object textures and distance art)
- Fixed solo view editor issues when going back to edit mode from game mode
- Added ability to change the brush colors in DromEd via values in DromEd.cfg.
- Added light-based transparency property
- Added ability to enable/disable eye zoom in Thief 2
- Vast improvements to editor dialogs, including crash fixes and improved functionality
- Increased brush limit from 7068 to 16384
- Increased rooms limit from 1024 to 4096
- Increased ambient sound limit from 256 to 1024
- Increased cell limit from 28672 to 32760
- Increased the maximum number of sides in a cylinder from 10 to 26.
- Increased automap location limit from 64 to 256 locations per page
- The texture rotation control can now interpret negative values
- Fixed a crash while generating reports
- Added a warning dialog when attempting to save one filetype (mis/gam/cow) as another
- Added new Windows-style texture palette (which also supports more than 256 textures)
- Added support for all editor window sizes
- Added Pendulum (/sinusoidal) curve type to tweqs
- Added DetailAttachement link type
- Added Distance Alpha property
- Added Bitmap Color property for custom modulation color on bitmap objects
- Added “Face camera (axial)” setting to Bitmap Worldspace
- Added color param, additive blending and spotlight cone falloff support to coronas
- Added “Editor Comments” property
- Added “show_vhots” command for debug visuals of vhot placement and numbering on objects
- Manually deleting links in the link view dialog no longer deletes attached object for ParticleAttachement/DetailAttachement links
- Added the ability to place graphical decals on book pages
- Corpses with Contains links no longer count as pickpockets
- The Auto-Multibrush property no longer crashes DromEd if the .vbr file was not found.
- The stimulus on existing receptrons can now be changed
- The intensity for sources is no longer reset when changing the propagator
- The receptrons list now correctly shows the max intensity value for existing receptrons
- Meshes can now be scaled with the Scale property
- Scaled objects now cast properly scaled shadows
- Objects can now obscure coronas
- Bitmap Worldspace objects can now be locally lit
- Precipitation will now collide with OBB objects as well as terrain
- The brush_to_room command can now be given a negative number, to be interpreted as an absolute size instead of a percentage (e.g. brush_to_room -0.1 would create a room brush 0.1 units larger than the selected brush.)
- It is no longer necessary to explicitly add the Hidden property to a secret object for the secret to be properly counted
- Added numeric keypad input support
- DromEd will no longer stop working after 03:14:07 on Tuesday, 19 January 2038
- Added “scroll here” option to the right-click menu for solo views, similar to the “teleport camera” option for non-solo views
- Fixed some issues with calculating which room cells are in (which might have caused problems with precipitation and fogging)
- Increased the time range of Tweqs to 0-65535
- The same property can no longer be added to an object multiple times
- Fixed a crash when adding the Texture Anim Data property to a concrete object
- See the included modders_notes.txt for more details on editor changes
Balatro Textures
by Jason Otto on Jul.19, 2011, under Textures
These texture packs have been floating around for a while, but haven’t had a host. Four zip files. Grab them here
Help Pick My Next Project
by Jason Otto on Apr.18, 2011, under DromEd
Since I only do contest missions, and there are no contest at the moment that I’m involved with I’ve been bored. I need a focus, and the contests do that for me. To that end. Here’s a survey, its the first one I’ve made. This will determine the general location and factions involved in my next mission. I’ll use this to create the resource portfolio and write a plot. The second survey will follow the development of the plot.
EDIT: I’ve closed the poll. The winner is city streets, with mages and a bit of the undead.
Jorge 2
by Jason Otto on Jan.10, 2011, under DromEd, Textures
Say hi to jorge2, a better version of jorge. I’ve used this for a while to align textures in my missions.
New Fancy Furniture
by Jason Otto on Nov.21, 2010, under Models
A few new furniture objects, a new fancy table, chairs, armiore, dresser and sofa. These are based on some higher quality object textures I found, but the models are all mine. 
I reworked textures from 1024 x 1024 or 512 x 512 down to a smaller size and of course completely texture mapped the objects. The fancy furniture in this pack is suitable for a noble’s home and looks a lot better than some of the original objects. More Here
Contest Score Card
by Jason Otto on Aug.08, 2010, under Contest
| Mission | Game | Story | Design | Total | Average |
| Captain of The Guard | 5.75 | 6.025 | |||
| 8 | 7 | 8 | 7.75 | ||
| 5 | 2 | 10 | 5.5 | ||
| 9 | 1 | 6 | 6.25 | ||
| 6 | 4 | 4 | 5 | ||
| 8 | 3 | 7 | 6.5 | ||
| 7 | 5 | 9 | 7 | ||
| 1 | 2 | 1 | 1.25 | ||
| 10 | 5 | 10 | 8.75 | ||
| 10 | 2 | 4 | 6.5 | ||
| 8 | 3 | 8 | 6.75 | ||
| 8 | 5 | 5 | 6.5 | ||
| 10 | 7 | 8 | 8.75 | ||
| 8 | 4 | 5 | 6.25 | ||
| 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | ||
| 7 | 7 | 5 | 6.5 | ||
| 5 | 6 | 6 | 5.5 | ||
| 2 | 4 | 9 | 4.25 | ||
| 8 | 6 | 7 | 7.25 | ||
| 5 | 8 | 4 | 5.5 | ||
| Escape from Hammer Hill | 7 | 7.845238 | |||
| 7 | 6 | 7 | 6.75 | ||
| 10 | 10 | 10 | 10 | ||
| 10 | 5 | 10 | 8.75 | ||
| 7 | 7 | 8 | 7.25 | ||
| 10 | 8 | 7 | 8.75 | ||
| 8 | 7 | 9 | 8 | ||
| 8 | 8 | 9 | 8.25 | ||
| 7 | 5 | 7 | 6.5 | ||
| 10 | 10 | 10 | 10 | ||
| 8 | 8 | 8 | 8 | ||
| 8 | 5 | 7 | 7 | ||
| 5 | 5 | 4 | 4.75 | ||
| 8 | 6 | 8 | 7.5 | ||
| 7 | 6 | 8 | 7 | ||
| 8 | 7 | 7 | 7.5 | ||
| 7 | 8 | 7 | 7.25 | ||
| 8 | 8 | 10 | 8.5 | ||
| 8 | 6 | 8 | 7.5 | ||
| 9 | 8 | 8 | 8.5 | ||
| 10 | 10 | 10 | 10 | ||
| A Night’s Profit | 7 | 7.45 | |||
| 7 | 7 | 9 | 7.5 | ||
| 8 | 5 | 7 | 7 | ||
| 6 | 4 | 6 | 5.5 | ||
| 10 | 8 | 8 | 9 | ||
| 6 | 7 | 7 | 6.5 | ||
| 9 | 7 | 8 | 8.25 | ||
| 8 | 4 | 7 | 6.75 | ||
| 10 | 9 | 10 | 9.75 | ||
| 10 | |||||
| 8.5 | 5 | 8 | 7.5 | ||
| 8 | 6 | 7 | 7.25 | ||
| 8 | 6 | 7 | 7.25 | ||
| 6 | 5 | 6 | 5.75 | ||
| 8 | 7 | 8 | 7.75 | ||
| 6 | 6 | 5 | 5.75 | ||
| 9 | 9 | 8 | 8.75 | ||
| 7 | 5 | 8 | 6.75 | ||
| 8 | 5 | 7 | 7 | ||
| 8 | 7 | 9 | 8 | ||
| Settling A Score | 9 | 6.8625 | |||
| 7 | 5 | 6 | 6.25 | ||
| 9 | 7 | 9 | 8.5 | ||
| 5 | 5 | 6 | 5.25 | ||
| 8 | 6 | 6 | 7 | ||
| 8 | 3 | 8 | 6.75 | ||
| 8 | 8 | 8 | 8 | ||
| 5 | 4 | 2 | 4 | ||
| 10 | 10 | 8 | 9.5 | ||
| 5 | 4 | 6 | 5 | ||
| 7 | 6 | 6 | 6.5 | ||
| 7 | 7 | 6 | 6.75 | ||
| 7 | 5 | 6 | 6.25 | ||
| 6 | 6 | 6 | 6 | ||
| 5 | 5 | 5 | 5 | ||
| 5 | 5 | 5 | 5 | ||
| 7 | 7 | 9 | 7.5 | ||
| 10 | 8 | 9 | 9.25 | ||
| 6 | 6 | 7 | 6.25 | ||
| 10 | 8 | 10 | 9.5 | ||
The raw scores. One user sent me only the composite score, so I can’t include it in the final statistics, but I used it in scoring the missions overall. The highest rating for each sub score was Escape from Hammer Hill. This mission showed consistent quality across the board. It sometimes happens that a mission will out score others for a single category, having incredible design but no story for example. I also have comments on some of the missions I’m sorting to send on to the authors.
