Sotha

Ah, good question! I should have talked more about it in the video. Here I had a simple walls without any features and I still used the modules. It is true that I could have gotten exactly the same result by simply making the walls the traditional way by dragging new brushes between the window/door modules. Sure, using the modules will result in little bit more tris than using the traditional way, but the small extra amount of tris is so little, it does not matter. But imagine if I had spent more time in the module building and made some really fancy looking wall modules. Now I would immediately benefit from the modular approach over the traditional way, because making a single high detail module and cloning it around gets me more details very quickly rather than building each detailed wall section the traditional way. Also the modules give be these benefits: 1) I can control each modules piece shadow casting (a performance improvement tool) and 2) it is very quick to re-arrange stuff with the models (if I build the traditional way, I cannot just reshuffle geometry pieces to get the resut I want.) If the modules were of very high detail, I could also make each module to have LOD detail models (but that's a lot of work). Oh, and also, the wall modules had already textures that were perfectly aligned with all the other modules (I used the FIT operation in the surface inspector). If I would build the traditional way, I would be facing the extra work of aligning every single wall piece textures by hand (lots of boring work). Yes, the engine treats func_statics differently than worldspawn. Someone more proficient with the engine, may correct me, but I think that dmap does not optimize func_statics in any way. This way they can have any kind of weird arrangement of brushes and the engine will just treat it as a model. Worldspawn gets optimized during dmap. This may result is unexpected results if you have made weird brushwork. Thus, IMHO, worldspawn should be just used for simple geometry of sealing brushes (and floors.) Everything else is good to be func_statics. This makes the work less error-prone. The floors must be worldspawn so that the AI can walk on it. The AI does not see or feel func_statics! The AAS nagivation mesh will be applied on worldspawn. When talking about func_statics, I must remind that the AI does not 0see of feel it. All func_statics must be monsterclipped. This will have it's own part in the mapping blog later. Yes. The engine treats func_static and worldspawn differently. The main benefit is that the func_statics are grouped (they are quick and easy to clone around), and I can control the shadows of each individual module, and the func_static can be anything and the dmap will not try to optimize/change it. I always try to build so that floors, monsterclip and sealing walls are worldspawn. Everything else if func_static. It makes life so much easier.

Of course it is okay to ask questions. I hope I can provide an answer, though... I made the support beam 45-degree piece the way I did because it was a quick way to do it. Since the beam is a func_static, it is sort of a model, so it does not matter if the 45-degree piece penetrates into the horizontal and vertical beams. I could have cut the 45-degree piece with the clipper so that it was flush against the beams, but there is no incentive to do so. When working with worldspawn brushes, then the mapper needs to be more careful. I would make sure all worldspawn brushes are blocky, 90-degree and in grid 8. Slanted sealing worldspawn brushes is like asking for trouble.

All uploads have been completed. Obsttorte, thanks for the tip. Where is the noise suppression setting? It's a youtube thing? I'm definitely not gonna re-encode and upload the videos if the noise suppression requires that.

Uploading parts 3 and 4 now. @Jetrell, thanks for your interest. I joined this community around 2007 (wow a decade ago next september! Time truly flies when you're having fun!) and started learning DR. Before that I had fiddled just a little with mapping for Doom 1, Half life 1 and Farcry, but those works were never released. I was just playing around and testing stuff. So yeah, one could say that I have over a decade of hobbyist expertise with game editors. But you do not need years of experience to get basic or advanced level of proficiency. I would argue that if you watch this video series, do the A-Z mapping tutorial here ( http://wiki.thedarkmod.com/index.php?title=A_-_Z_Beginner_Full_Guide_Start_Here! ) and make your own little 1-5 room mission, then you have learned everything it takes to efficiently create missions. Each mapper might have a different mapping technique (or workflow.) The one you see in this video series is the one I have developed for myself over the years: it is fast, efficient and fun. I think, learning the DR editor is quite fast: basically you just repeat simple steps over again (create brush, texture, clone, place). But the mapping technique is the thing that takes longer to develop. Perhaps this video series provides a shortcut for new mappers? Why to map? For me it a creative exhaust. I like to create new stuff. Some people paint or draw, but I'm not very good in those, so I map. One especially fun part in mapping that it has many components: creation of a place out of nothing, telling a story, making fun gameplay, etc.

My computer went to sleep while uploading so the process was interrupted. Now it is finally uploaded. Sorry about that and enjoy!

I am uploading part 2 now. It will be here once the processing is complete:

Thanks! I do not know how many parts it will be, but I am guessing it will be 5-10 parts. Time completion: I think the video editing, exporting and uploading is the slowest part of the process. I am more familiar with mapping than video stuff. The mapping is currently one third to half way ready, but in the end, it depends how much time I can allocate on this. Maybe, depending how busy I am RL, I'll get it ready before summer. The player starts in the back yard, as indicated by the plan.

Hello! I'm making a small/tiny 1-5 room mission, and recording the building process as a video. I'll upload the videos here as I go forward with the project. The series should give new mappers some idea what it takes to make a TDM mission. It will also teach the basics of modular building. ATTENTION! These videos fully document the build process of the mission. If you want to play the mission without spoilers, please refrain from watching the videos until the mission is released and you've completed it. Massive spoilers start now! Part 1: Introduction Part 2: Modules Part 3: Basic Geometry Part 4: Basic Backyard Part 5: Interior Details Part 6: Backyard Details Part 7: Lights Part 8: Monsterclip & AI Part 9: Objectives & Readables Part 10: Sounds Part 11: Finishing Touches Part 12: Briefing & Packaging Part 13: Betatest Fixes

...he invented time travelling?! Amazing!

Thanks for playing, I am glad you liked them! U3 is in the works and actually it is pretty long along the path, but I do not have time to work on it due to busy Real Life . Also I'm having a sort of artistic block with it as I feel I'm not bringing forth anything new. It is basically U2 in a new environment, which I suppose would suffice to many, but I really, really, really would like to put something EXTRA in it... but do not have the time. Let's see. Hopefully, at some point, I have time to finalize it. Either quickly completed as-is.. Or with the EXTRA's.

Don't whip yourself too hard, man. It happens to everyone of us. Remember the time when I released Phrase Book. There were some unpickable doors, which broke the mission for many. Let's just fix it! Howsabout quickly updating the most critical bugs, and putting the updated mission in the internet. Then add the TDM update thread a line "For those interested in the saint lucia prequel, the version that comes with the mod has some bugs. You can download an updated ultra-hot-fixed version of the mission conveniently from this link. Just overwrite the prologue9.pk4 in the fms folder and you are good to go."

@grayman, 1) the desk settings are okay and not to blame. 2) the book bounced in the desk when I opened it and the frobbing was impeded. Thus the desk door ceetainly had an interaction with the book and with the problem. 3) the only visible issue is the book clipping. 4) if the book moved on problematic opening of the desk door and there is confirmed interaction between the book and the door, the book clipping with the door is the most likely cause.

Can't the mission downloader bring a mission update? I inspected the desk settings and they seemed to be correct. See the picture? The books clip with the desk door. Books and desk door are selected in this picture. This is the reason for the failure. If you would use the small book model (models/darkmod/readables/book_red1_small.lwo) instead of the big tome, the books would not clip with the desk door.

Glad you had fun! You might want to check my other missions. The Golden Skull is somewhat similar to this one. Then there are the Ulysses and Thomas Porter series. Ulysses is easier and TP missions are rather difficult. My missions from my earlier period are harder than my more recent ones. It is good idea to play the series missions in order, however.

I agree 100%. Always better to have a short but focused mission, rather than a long defocused one. I personally enjoy most the missions that last from 30-60min. Those can be played in one session and you stay hooked all the time. Longer than 60min starts to get tiresome and it cannot be played in one session.

I know how it feels, been there myself, too. If the baby&wife let me, I'll have a look at it today or weekend.. The desk is probably the standard prefab desk, right? That should be configured correctly out of the box. I suspect the book touches the desk door and that causes it. At least I clearly saw the book move when the desk first opened. Perhaps the book interrupts the desk door at low opening percentage and causes it to cycle quickly between closed and open state. This triggers the no-frob entity and puts the thing out-of-sync. Moving the book inside the desk, so that it is absolutely clear of the desk door collision area would probably fix it.

The admins have been informed of the situation and a rollback can hopefully happen soon. Sorry about the inconvenience.

Fun mission. Short, straightforward and sweet. There was a critical bug, unfortunately: Got I am such a climbing noob: I was just fumbling around and gradually losing health to small falling accidents. Like a drunkard parkourer. hehe. Speaking of drunkards.. I also made a huge commotion in the bar, because I wanted to move the candle so that I could rob the cash box in darkness. I tossed the tankards at it, but the candle just moved to a better position on the table. Then the barmaid came to the rescue and pushed the candle to the floor. Good times! Thanks for the mission.

Just go for it. Anyone who can learn to use computer programs can learn DR. It just takes time and patience like all learning. It is fun, too. Just make a small 1-5 room mission first. It is more fun than to try to eat more than you can swallow in one go.

It loops for me too! I think it did when I updated to 2.04 as well. This should be probably fixed ASAP, because potential new players, who are not that tech-savvy, might simply give up when the updater does not work out of the box. Looks bad if the default install doesn't work, but one needs to figure out to put a mark in a tab in some advanced menu.

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I see no issues in having nuclear power in a steampunk setting. The steam that the punk requires can be easily generated with something else than coal. Just apply copper colored tanks and equipment with analog meters and you're good to go.