FTL Games developed the free tool DMPACK.TOS for Atari ST and posted it on GEnie.
Here is the description built into the tool:
This utility compresses a Dungeon Master saved game into a shortened format which can be read by the Chaos Strikes Back Utility Disk. It removes all data from the saved game which is copyrighted by FTL Games/Software Heaven, Inc. The shortened saved game is intended solely to enable CSB owners to exchange advanced Dungeon Master Champions for import into Chaos Strikes Back.
Technically, this tool opens a Dungeon Master for Atari ST saved game file (DMGAME.DAT) and replaces the dungeon with an empty mini dungeon. All other parts of the saved game are not changed (and not even decrypted).
Here are the messages posted on GEnie by Wayne Holder about the creation of this tool:
Category 9, Topic 38 Message 66 Fri Jan 05, 1990 FTL at 23:40 EST Regarding the practice of uploading saved games with super Champions. I think it spoils much of the fun of a role playing game to do this, but more importantly, to us, we cannot approve of this practice because the data file created by DM or CSB, in addition to the unique data related to a particular game, also contains copyrighted material which we are legally obliged to protect. While I don't want to be heavy handed, I have had discussions with Sysops about this in that past and I hope this practice stops soon. Category 9, Topic 38 Message 75 Tue Jan 09, 1990 FTL at 15:43 EST Regarding Saved Game Uploading: I don't mean to make a big stink over this, but unfortunately there are more serious problems we face, such as piracy, that require us to protect our copyrights aggressively. If we allow some materials to be copied, but restrict others it could weaken our position with regard to piracy. The idea to separate user created data and copyright data is a good one. We just didn't consider it before, but I'll look into it. However, we encourage you to upload Champion Portrait files which are your own creation. That was why we defined a separate portrait file type. If anyone is interested, we could publish the file format? Category 9, Topic 38 Message 91 Wed Jan 17, 1990 FTL at 19:56 EST Regarding the debate over my request to stop uploading saved games. I think I can propose an alternate solution. As I mentioned before, my concern is primarily protecting our copyrights. I really don't want to discourage people from trading Champions. However, currently the saved game file contains more than the Champion stats. In discussing this with my staff we came up with the idea of creating a utility that would extract only the Champion data from a game file and convert it into a form that could be uploaded and directly read by the Chaos Strikes Back Utility disk. Would this be an acceptable solution? Category 9, Topic 38 Message 118 Thu Feb 01, 1990 FTL at 20:11 EST We have completed programming the utility to compact the DM save games so that they can be uploaded for Champion swapping. We will test for a day or so before we upload, but are there any volunters for further testing? -Wayne- Category 9, Topic 38 Message 119 Fri Feb 02, 1990 FTL at 21:40 EST I have uploaded the Dungeon Master saved game packer "DMPACK.TOS" This is a "beta" release. I'd appreciated any feedback. -Wayne Holder, FTL Games- Category 9, Topic 38 Message 121 Tue Feb 06, 1990 FTL at 22:57 EST We considered allowing the packer to export CSB games, but we felt that would be too powerful of a cheat because some enterprising soul would recycle Champions through CSB until they were simply invincible. It's a good idea, but I think would tend to devalue the accomlishment of of people who build their own parties the hard way. Category 9, Topic 38 Message 123 Wed Feb 07, 1990 FTL at 20:57 EST Currently, Champions do not exist separate from a saved game file. The CSB Champion Portrait Editor is able to extract Champions from one game and insert them into another, but currently we have not yet defined a format for export of Champions alone. The DMPACKER program was a quick way to solve a problem caused by the fact that saved games contain info copyrighted by us. It simply strips a saved game down to bare bones so that it can be uploaded. The problem is that the CSB Champion Portrait Editor was only designed to currently import DM games. CSB games are in a different format. I understand your request and we are currently considering how we can support this in the future, but it's not the kind of thing we can do now because we first need to consider how this will fit into other future plans we have. Sorry.