Using: The Homeworld Excel Mapper

I heartily recommend Excel. Every file you edit to make a map is a text file, also, every value in these text files is separated by a comma. So this means that by using the comma delimited properties when you open up a text file in excel you will be able to edit the file you open as you would any sheet you open with excel. Especially for making big sweeping changes which could require ages of typing in number after number, excel can accomplish this in moments.

With that in mind I use the same worksheet to begin every map. By the time I'm finished the worksheet is usually changed beyond recognition, with little changes and tweaks made here and there to do what I want to achieve. You can download the Excel Spreadsheet here. It may take a while to fully get the hang of it, but I recommend it, Excel is a doddle, ergo, making maps with excel is, to quote TAKER: '...As easy as Apple-Pie'. Read more on how to use Excel.

Dylov [17/12/00]

 

The Strands, Rings and Distances Excel Utility (v1.3 HW)

Written by Dylov and TAKER. Download it Here.

The Strands, Rings and Distances Excel Utility (the SRD-XL Utility) consists of 5 Excel worksheets linked together. If you are familiar with Excel these sheets will be of boundless and speedy help when placing rings and strands of asteroids, player start positions or just checking distances on your maps.

The Homeworld SRD-XL Utility consists of seven worksheets;

Worksheets

1. Strand creator
(Used to generate continuous chains of cylinders)

2. Tilting Ring Maker
(Used to generate Rings of continuous chains of cylinders)
3. Player/Resource Distances Editor
(A number of usful elements, primarily dealing with player placement and local player resources)

Worksheets ready to save as .csv files

4. Resourcesphere output Worksheet
(Prepared for Resourcesphere_#.missphere files)

5. Ring Resourcesphere output Worksheet
(Prepared for Resourcesphere_#.missphere files)
6. LevelfilesFFA output worksheet
(Prepared for Levelname#.Level files optimised for Free For All setup)

7. LevelfilesTEAM output worksheet
(Prepared for Levelname#.Level files optimised for Team setup)

 

The Spreadsheet uses the same colour scheme throughout, if a box is in light-yellow, you input values there, if a box is in darker yellow/orange, you never type in there as output data will be displayed there.

 

Using Excel to aid in your Map Making Efforts

Before you begin to use this spreadsheet you will need to have at least some idea of what you want the finished map to look like. I suggest using graph paper to show a top down view of your map (a 2D view), where the centre of your map is the co-ordinates x=0, y=0 or (0,0). The y-axis is the vertical axis, and the x-axis is the horizontal axis bisecting at 90 degrees to the y axis.

The centre point is actually point x, y, z, (The co-ordinates 0,0,0,). Positive x values to the right of co-ordinate 0,0,0, and positive y co-ordinates above 0,0,0, on your 2D map. The positive z co-ordinates are the 3D points above the plane of the map (Up/Down).

 

 

Worksheets

 

1. Strand Creator (Dylov)

Used to generate the required co-ordinates for the 'Resourcesphere_1.missphere' file for continuous chains of cylinders. This sheet will carry out all the required calculations when placing the various cylinder asteroid-clusters end to end and have them all facing the correct way.

Draw out your strand on your map, marking where the turns, and/or ends of the individual cylinder asteroid-clusters are, so you can work out the co-ordinates. Once you have done this its a simple matter to just copy these co-ordinates into the relevant positions on the sheet (in the x Coord, y Coord and z Coord boxes shown in Light-Yellow).

The Strand sheet will generate the co-ordinates of the cylinder, the length of the cylinder, and the angles of rotation so that a cylinder will be placed BETWEEN the two co-ordinates you have entered, each cylinder beginning at the first co-ordinate entered and ending at the second one and so on. The generated lines will be passed on to the Resourcesphere sheet preformatted to save as a '.csv' file.

Notes:

Any empty co-ordinate lines will be read as 0,0,0 and Excel will still use this co-ordinate to generate a cylinder. For example; say you enter a number of co-ordinates, but not enough to fill the table (Which is set up to input 33 co-ordinates (& generate 32 continuous cylinders). If you have an empty box (for example, you only want a stand made up of 10 co-ordinates (or 9 cylinders end to end), Excel will read any empty boxes as co-ordinate 0,0,0 and will generate a cylinder between your last inputted co-ordinate and 0,0,0, so pay attention to the lines you copy into your Resourcesphere file.

There are three separate tables where you can input co-ordinates, these all perform exactly the same function, I just found I wanted more space so I could manipulate a number of strands at the same time without have to delete everything all the time, the third one labelled resources is no different other than it generates the data in the preformatted '.csv' sheet which correct labelling of the '.dist' files to produce resource clusters. You can easily change what cylinder consists of what in the resourcesphere sheet, just don't change the lengths, co-ordinates and angles of rotation. (See the Notes on The Resourcesphere Worksheet below).

 

2. Tilting Ring Maker (TAKER)

This easy-to-use sheet will generate a set of 24 cylinders of the required length and rotation to form a ring around the required co-ordinates. There are 5 sheets, all are identical, I always found that I wanted to work with more than one ring at a time, and five seemed the most optimal number, considering size of the saved xls file, and actual volume space used on the worksheet.

The Central Point of the ring is designated in the boxes labelled Shift x, Shift y and Shift z. input the co-ordinates here.

The Radius will generate the size of the ring, (where 2r is the diameter!), the radius is measured from the inputted x, y, z co-ordinates which is 0,0,0, by default.

The Tilt of the ring (box labelled Tilt X (deg)), will generate the 'y-rotation' value (Up/down where the angle is measured (or pivots) about the x-axis). 89.93 degrees will generate a vertical ring, excel gets a bit screwy when you go fully to 90°. All the data generated is passed onto the Ring Resourcesphere sheet (See the Notes on The Ring Resourcesphere Worksheet below).

 

3. Distances (Dylov)

Quite complicated to look at but hopefully easy to use. Contains several elements all using pretty much the same formulae.

This sheet primarily deals with the players only, everything else here is outputted into two worksheets ready to be saved as .csv files: the LevefileFFA and LevelfileTEAM worksheets, although, having said that, there is a teeny wee bit dealing with local player resources that outputs data to the Resourcesphere worksheet. Again with this worksheet, you can simply input your required data, and save the relevant LevefileFFA or LevelfileTEAM worksheet as a .csv files, open this .csv file in any text editor, then copy and paste the bits you need directly into your relevant Level file and Mothership_#.missphere files.

Resource Clouds or other points of reference table

You can input your own co-ordinates for the positions of resource spheres, cylinders, derelicts or other points of note and the sheet will calculate the distances between them. This information is displayed on the adjacent table, and the co-ordinates you input will be passed on to the Player Start Co-ordinate Table as well as the relevant section in the Resourcesphere sheet (See the Notes on The Resourcesphere Worksheet below).

Player Start Co-ordinates; Optional Player Start Co-ordinates

You can input your own co-ordinates for the positions where each player starts on the map and the sheet will calculate the distances between each player. This information is displayed on the adjacent table, and the co-ordinates you input will be passed on to the Player Start Co-ordinate Table as well as the relevant section in the Levelfile sheet (See The Levelfile Sheets (FFA and TEAM) Worksheet below).

Player Start Co-ordinates; Player Distribution Parameters

Player Start Positions are generated for maps, by using the Global Position Settings to set the radius of a ring of players, any shift in y rotation (up/down) or shift in z rotation (left/right) of this ring of players. You can use these settings to generate equal distances about the co-ordinates 0,0,0, or modify these co-ordinates in the Co-ordinates Shift Table. Each individual Player number game type can be individually modified to produce the best fit for your map.

Team Game Distribution parameters

Team game set up will group players together in groups of 2, 3 or 4 depending on the amount of teams required, all players will start in a ring about the co-ordinates 0,0,0, only grouped closer together. Again, modify this location with the Co-ordinates Shift Table if you want the centre of you ring of players to be moved from the centre of the map. Each individual Team player-number game type can be individually modified to produce the best fit for your map.

The Player Start Co-ordinates Table

This table has been optimised for use with the Excel 'Autofilter' function. Select (or highlight) anywhere on the table, then from the menu choose Data then Filter then AutoFilter. Used the little arrows above the Type button and the Number button and it will reduce the lists to show only selected game type calculations.

 

 

Worksheets ready to save as .csv files

 

4. The Resourcesphere Worksheet

This is a ready formatted sheet that will take the co-ordinates generated from the Strand Creator Worksheet. Also at the very bottom of this page, is data outputted from the Distances Worksheet; specifically from the Resource Clouds or other points of reference table.

Do not change any area you see in Yellow, i.e.; the x, y and z co-ordinates, and the y and z rotations, as these are all generated numbers and thus are imported data. All the cells of imported date are coloured do not touch any of these coloured boxes. Of course, change everything else that is in the non-coloured boxes, especially Quantity and Radius, you will know yourself what sort of values you want here. Always remember case, and format when changing anything.

Save this sheet as a text file; Select File, Save As and in the Save as type box select CSV (Comma delimited (*.csv). Then, open this *.csv file with a text editor (such as Textpad) and just copy the relevant lines directly into your ResourceSphere_#.missphere file. Saving in .csv format will save your data in text exactly as required by Homeworld, its a simple matter of copying and pasting what you want into your existing resourcesphere file, or saving the whole shebang, it will work as long as its named in the Level file.

 

5. The Ring Resourcesphere Worksheet

This is a ready formatted sheet that will take the co-ordinates generated from TAKERS Tilted Ring sheet. All five of the Ring Worksheets output their generated Data here. (See above for what to do when saving this sheet).

 

6 & 7. The Levelfile (FFA and TEAM) Worksheets

These are pre-formatted sheets that will input the player start co-ordinates from the Distances sheet. Do not change any area you see in Yellow, i.e.; the x, y and z Player Start Co-ordinates and the Rotation value (facing). These yellow cells contain imported data from the Distances sheet. Save this sheet as a .csv file and copy the data into the relevant areas of your '.level' and '.missphere' file.

You can change anything else in the non coloured boxes, if you want to add more ships, select the entire line and copy paste it below, just make sure your new yellow boxes are pointing to the correct cells to receive their imported data, this only requires a modicum of Excel knowledge to do, and so is simple to set up this file outputting several lines of ships for the Mothership files, such as harvesters, research ships and so on. (See above for what to do when saving this sheet).

 

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© Dylov 2000. Written by Dylov. Original Page Designs by Dylov & Panther.