toggle classic/reforged

[Herod]

I didnt find any topics, but I want make a map dual classic/reforged HD compatible and need to know what i need to do it

 

[Chaosium]

I don't think there's anything particular to do other than having both in "supported modes" in the map options

 

[Herod]

I don't think there's anything particular to do other than having both in "supported modes" in the map options

View attachment 478861

ok, but if I set to classic, the map put classic units, and if I choose HD it put HD units on map, I´ve seen this in a map and would like to know how do

 

[Xthreo]

I guess in the case you set the graphic to HD and important all the classic models you want to use (or the other way around)

 

[Uncle]

ok, but if I set to classic, the map put classic units, and if I choose HD it put HD units on map, I´ve seen this in a map and would like to know how do

File/Preferences to adjust your Editor's asset mode:

Scenario/Map Properties to enforce an asset mode once playing the map:

The only way to mix SD and HD assets is to use imports. (As far as I understand)

 

[Retera]

I was following this topic during the development of Reforged, and it was evident that corporate apathy at Activision on this topic ran pretty strongly. There were a few Activision employees active on Hive related discords while Reforged was being developed, and one of them described how to do what you're asking but it seemed really painful. Maybe they fixed this, but at the time the World Editor was literally broken.

So on a high level, in the game:

1. If a unit requires the model units\human\footman\footman.mdx for the unit appearance, sometimes you can import a model at _hd.w3mod\units\human\footman\footman.mdx and then if the game is running in HD mode every file at _hd.w3mod\ prefix is loaded first instead of models without that file path prefix
2. If a unit must change model between SD and HD, any unit setting in Unit Editor (such as file for the model, if we use CTRL+D to display as data) can have an HD or SD specific override value, such as file:hd=units\orc\grunt\grunt and file:sd=units\human\footman\footman.
3. An imported MDX model can have a different appearance between the SD and HD modes. As an example, I uploaded a model file called "The Emperor's New Table" on the model section, which was an SD table but in the HD graphics mode there were vases on the table. So the joke was that only the pure in heart (who paid Activision for HD mode) could see the vases sitting on the table. However, the model was taken down by the staff on the basis that it was not a good model, and I don't remember where the link is. But the premise could theoretically exist in a 3D file -- unfortunately only in one direction. Stuff that is HD mode in the model file disappears in "SD", but the same is not true in reverse. So the model isn't ever really going to look good in the "HD" mode if you do this, because its "SD" portions will always be showing.

So out of the three options described above, only #1 and #2 are really sensible/viable. I remember making a test map with a unit who looked like Grunt on the SD and Footman on the HD, or maybe vice versa, back in the day. And this map had no imported files; I did this by using the second option (#2) described above. Unfortunately, back in the day when the Activision employee showed us how to do it on Discord, the World Editor program was broken. So, if you had file:hd setting on your unit and file:sd setting also, any time that you edited the map in the HD mode it would read from file:hd and save back to file:sd or something, basically nuking the non Reforged version.

So the only way to construct a map where this actually worked, at least back then, was to construct a map in a format that the Reforged game understood but with a program separate from the Reforged World Editor or else develop the map entirely in Classic Graphics Mode and then test it on Reforged mode without ever saving the map while the editor is in Reforged graphics mode, since it would overwrite the base file paths and overwrite the classic mode inside the map if you do.

Honestly, I hope someone else gets on here and says, "NO! No Retera, that bug was fixed in 2021! You can open and save your custom map without destroying it now!" but I'm getting old. I don't want to care about Activision's apathetic crap. So I'm just sharing my memory from before I gave up on being willing to bother. Instead, if I was going to make a large Warcraft III project that I was really passionate about, I would make it with the Classic Graphics mode. In part, maybe this is because that is the Frozen Throne game that I enjoy, and its graphics do not bother me. But on a more serious level, the Classic Graphics projects can be extracted out onto a computer system with less DRM and tracking, whereas the Reforged graphics are locked to the DRM system. So for example, in 2040 if Microsoft shuts down the Reforged servers, all the Reforged graphics mode custom maps just die. The average person won't know how to run an old version of the Reforged game, because that's too technical and painful for them, and they just want to click "Play" on the new Battle.net launcher.

But the old Frozen Throne client was always technical, and we always knew how to run it without anyone else's permission, and so after Reforged dies we will continue to run Frozen Throne. And at that point, it will be only the classic maps who survive.

I am not interested in an expiration date on my passion projects, although I am admittedly aware that my lifespan is finite.

 

[Xthreo]

But the old Frozen Throne client was always technical, and we always knew how to run it without anyone else's permission, and so after Reforged dies we will continue to run Frozen Throne. And at that point, it will be only the classic maps who survive.

I am not interested in an expiration date on my passion projects, although I am admittedly aware that my lifespan is finite.

I never thought about this!
You’re right, it’s actually worrying to think that a reforged-only map could break in the future

Thank you Retera again for your insight

 

[Retera]

You’re right, it’s actually worrying to think that a reforged-only map could break in the future

To be fair, projects like Warcraft III: Community Edition claim to be able to run 1.36.2 maps on a 1.29 client (which is old enough that it runs without requiring a network server at Activision to give it permission), so by the blood, sweat, and tears of people like @MindWorX it's possible that all the goobers who opened and saved their maps post 1.33 and wrote over their data in the new formats without even realizing how annoying and different the new formats are, ultimately will still be able to run their maps in the modded "doesn't need permission" client.

But Reforged graphics were designed to be too computationally complicated for a modder to backport into a client like that. My technical opinion is that until AI is so extremely smart that all software is written by AI, and all proprietary software on this planet is open source because AI can reverse engineer any of it instantly -- until that epoch, while we continue to live in the days of human effort, no human on Earth will have sufficient time to reverse engineer Reforged PKB and make them render on a legacy patch. The other stuff like ORM and normal maps, maybe, you know, it's just some math. But the PKB is gobbletygook. It looked like it was designed that nobody but its creators could render it to the screen.