[TOOL] [Adt edit] ADT Converter

[Mjollna]

[center:1pajf7nz]ADT Converter by Pagdzin and Mjollnà[/center:1pajf7nz]

About this tool :

This programs allows conversion for adt pre-Cataclysm to Cataclysm format.
Conversion should be ok up to Cataclysm build 11927. This does not include Wow alpha files.
World building maps are partly supported for the moment (see read me file > updates).

Have fun !

Additional Info :

This is still a *beta version*.
Read Me file included (don't forget to set up the config file before launching).

Feedback more than welcome

Download :

http://mjollna.org/docs/ADTConverter_beta3.zip

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Edit : I add below the update fean really kindly made (on page 4 of this topic) so that it's clearer for people.
He has updated the ADT Converter to MoP, so that it generates the _obj1 and _tex1 that are now mandatory in live servers.

You can download his version here : http://www.feangren.net/divers/ADT_Conv ... ta_1.1.zip

Thx again fean

[akspa420]

Any chance of a converter to go the other way, like Cataclysm to 3.3.5? I can understand this being a huge improvement on the currently non-existant map editors for 4.x maps, so at least new creations can be tested with the better water and minor graphical improvements in 4.x.

[Mjollna]

Hello

As far as I'm concerned, it's not in my immediate plans.
Here are my reasons :

# Why converting from 4.x to 3.x ?

- As you said, all editing tools are for 3.x format. As a result, such a converter is not useful for custom maps.
In the end little content would be concerned : retail maps released since Cataclysm was released, for editing purposes.

- There would also be the new Cataclysm-only M2 to convert back to the older format I guess, to get a full map with all objects. And finally there would be some data change/loss (I'm mainly thinking about mcmt here... It's not much, but it's still all over Deephome).

# At the moment, I'm putting lots of efforts in learning a lot of things about programming, to improve my skills, knowledge and general understanding.
I have a few big books to continue reading, so maybe later, why not, but not now.

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Oh and btw : one of the users found a bug in the converter, so conversion may fail sometimes because of mcsh. We're working on fixing this (hum, well, actually Pag is), but in the meantime you can "kill all shadows" in Taliis before converting to skip the problem.

[Mjollna]

New beta version !

Bugfixes almost no one has probably run into, but it's corrected anyway. Collisions problem not solved, however.
I'm also adding the new link to the first post.

http://gaming.mjollna.org/docs/ADTConverter_beta3.zip

Edit 2017-04-21 : attached the program to the post and updated link.

[Mjollna]

@Keta :

I think my answer to you is too far in the chatbox history, so I'll just rewrite it here (and it could be helpful to others too that way).

- First of all, check that you used your own config file and not the one that is shipped by default with the newest version.

- If it's not the config file, if you want you can send me one of the adts that make the converter exit, so that I can see what's wrong and correct the program if there's a need to.

- For your java console error, it's very common and if you Google the error ("not recognized...") you'll find tutorials on how to solve it.

[Steff]

Thanks for your work with this. Haven't used  jet but find the idea nice.
Can someone post some images of custom ADTs with new water
If this realy works i could think about swap over to cata.

[Mjollna]

Hi !

Thank you for your message

It took us (Pag and I) a lot of time to code the program, but I think it's really linked to the fact that we really started from scratch : for me, first program being more than a quick 50 lines script, I hadn't really written a line of code in the last 4 years, and for both of us first collaborative project. We also had to understand/learn both 3.x & 4.x adt formats and compare many files (and I didn't know about 010 editor templates at the time... no colors and no apparent structures in files display...).

But in the end, there's not much to change actually. It's mainly the same data split into three files instead of being grouped in one. There are some slight differences in headers (more zeros as some offsets become useless), and no more mcin.

For retail files I think now our conversion is as close as possible to Blizz one, and we haven't run into bugs for a long time regarding them.

For non-retail files (or retail files edited), we've run into some problems since there are several tools to edit them, resulting in small differences in implementing adt format : chunk sizes, optional chunks, chunks at unusual places...

I guess if our code had better design we would have less problems with all this, but we didn't have a real plan at the beginning (actually, we didn't really expect it would work so well when we started O_o), which results in a little more work now to correct bugs. Well, we've learned from that and it'll be useful for next time

And we still have that problem for collisions with custom maps... I'm not really sure about the problem, but if my guess is right, it'll probably be hard to correct (at least for me).

If you're not scared about all this, and if you're interested, I don't mind showing you the source

I made some screenshots but it was mainly for testing purposes, so I'm sorry some of the screens are, well... far from having great aesthetics
Here you go :

-- Retail map --
-> Kalidar.

-- Custom map --
-> A very quick test
with wmo + M2 + water (mclq).

-- Custom map --
-> Another test,
this time with mh2o (included with Gretchin's app). Yes I know it looks really ugly, the patch was a real patchwork of different things piled together. I think I have fraps video of that somewhere, I can upload it if someone's interested.

-- Retail map --
And the last one is 3.3.5
-> Northrend_27_22.adt
offsetfixed to more or less 30_30, and *then* converted. There's also water at the bottom (most likely mh2o).

-- Retail map --
I don't resist to add
-> this one,
 it has no water but I just love the way textures alone can be swapped with Cata adt xD

[Everon Mightbane]

To add the water in, what did you use?

[Mjollna]

At first I used allwater option from Taliis, and then we made a special update to support Gretchin's All water wotlk. It should work with both... Tell me if it doesn't, I don't have much feedback/testing from worldbuilders and we are probably going to find other problems with custom maps conversion.

It might be safer to add water just before you convert, to be sure there's no problem. The app adds mh2o at the end of the file, so the converter ("worldbuilding" option) is waiting for it at the end of the file. If it's not, it will probably not like it and reject the adt

[funnybunny]

has anyone been able to play cata using this tool? i have found now way to play using any edits :[

[Mjollna]

Hello,

I don't really understand your question... Have you had problems converting ? Could you be more specific ?

[funnybunny]

sorry, the converter works just fine, i cant figure out how to get the 4.0 client to load them, it seems custom mpqs have been fixed by blizz.

[Mjollna]

Oh, this

Indeed it's a different problem.

[funnybunny]

do you know if this can be done, or is there a different use for this tool. im just curious, this is awesome work.

[Mjollna]

Oh thank you ^__^

We made this tool for two reasons :
- Being able to explore older maps on Cataclysm client.
- Allow people who have created custom maps on 3.3.5 to use them on a Cataclysm server/client (and enjoy Cata water shaders for example).

And yes there is a way to get your adts working on a current live client, but as I said earlier, I don't give hints about live stuff.