This is why I picked up Mudlet. It appears to have the most powerful mapping system, and although this will be my first encounter with LUA, I have years of past experience with scripting in a language called AutoIt which should ease the difficulty.
As I understand it, wilderness mapping is pretty complex, and the documentation seems a bit limited so I opted to come chat with you fine folks and see what advice or links are out there, maybe even form a partnership or two.
It seems like with some decent experience, one could borrow a good script from a similar more popular MUD and adapt it to one's needs. While this is preferable in the interest of saving time, in my experience it's pretty difficult to do for your first rodeo with a particular language. This is where someone with more experience could really step in and help me bang this out.
Here is an example of what your character sees in the wilderness.
~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~::^^
::::~~::~~~~~~~~~~~~::~~~~
::::::::~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
::::::~~::~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
++::::++~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~tt~~~~~~~~~~
::::::++~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~tt~~~~~~~~
~~::~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~tt~~tt~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~tt~~~~~~tttt###:~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~tt~~~~tt::###:++~~++~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~tttttt~~::::::::::++++~~++
~~~~::~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ttt*~~~~::~~::++++~~++++~~
++::++~~~~~~~~~~tt#t::~~~~~~~~~~##++~~~~++
~~++~~~~~~~~~~++tttttt::~~~~~~~~++~~++~~~~
~~~~++~~~~~~~~~~tt~~tttt~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~tt~~tttt::~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~++++tttttt~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~++++++++tt~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
++~~~~~~~~~~++++~~tt~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~++~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~
The asterisk in the center represents your avatar. It never moves from the center.
So far the way I envision the script working is roughly like this...
(Just to be clear, any time I use the word "character" here it is referring to a character on the keyboard, not my actual avatar in the world.)
1) I find an epicenter in the world, put my avatar there and create a new room with a coordinate of (0,0)
2) Henceforth all movements will create new rooms. If i move one square northeast, for example, the coordinate of that new room is (1,1)
3) In the game, each time you move a square, a new survey is created. So the script will look for each new instances of the asterisk, copy the entire survey, and remove the carriage returns and empty spaces so it's all one continuous line.
4) The line is divided up into "squares" (each "square" contains two identical characters in the survey) and each one assigned an ID. For instance, the first two characters in the line would be identified as the very farthest northern "square" my avatar can see
5) The script then "reads" the ASCII art for each "square", in our example, ~~ which is water, and assigns that as the value for the new room that's to be placed there
6) The script, having kept track of where I am in the world, "stamps" the rooms onto the grid where they belong with their assigned terrain values
As a final step, I will want to create a ..bmp file from the finished product. Unless someone knows otherwise, it appears as though there is no way to export a map from Mudlet. Even if I could export it as a spreadsheet, I'm sure there is some software out there could then translate it into an actual image. If this is not an option, I may have to take screenshots of the map in Mudlet, one slice at a time, and stitch them together in photoshop.
So that's the plan... just looking for any feedback or useful documentation that may be out there before I begin, including but not limited to personal advice, tutorials, preexisting scripts, or suggestions for various code syntax. Once I get going I can post my progress here as well as any stumbling blocks I'm facing, and together we can create a very useful thread for anyone seeking how to do this for themselves, as the documentation is a bit limited.