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I've upgraded IPB to the latest stable version, and since this was a major upgrade (from 2.3.6) I also had to re-do the forum style. Most of the new stuff is in place, but I bet that the logo will be changed. One of the many new features in version 3 is rating of posts and also a "report spammer" ability which will make it easier to single out spam bots and ban then at sight. Hopefully this will stop some of the spam threads we've seen recently. Make sure to empty your browser cache if you're experiencing any problems. And please report any errors etc in this thread. Cheers, ~m2

In addition to the models you could make use of prefabs. That would save much time and it will be easier to create own missions in higher quality. A good example is the Amisfield Tower made by Komag: http://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?showtopic=8255 That would make a wonderfull prefab. Most people won't spend weeks for a building you may see only a few seconds in game, walking by or in the background. But if they are there as prefabs you just need to load it to your map, change a few textures rotate and scale it, remove or add a few brushes if u need to and it's ready. A wonderfull building which adds great atmosphere finished in a few minutes. You could do the same with candels with already added light entity, finished fireplaces, columns or evelators. The advantage of these prefabs is also that you can change them very easy to avoid that players think "I know exactly that from the last map, it's boring." What do you think about it?

Evening Where or how do I offer my prefabs for inclusion in TDM..? here is the download link - http://www.filefront...88329/hotel.zip the zip contains both a map and a prefab of the Hotel that was in my xmas mission.

So I'm working my way thruogh the brilliant A-Z Beginner Guide, when I ran into a bit of a problem. On page 3, it tells you how to put in a prefab sky. The problem I'm having is that when I'm in DarkRadiant and right-click on the grid view and select "Insert Prefab", I get an error message. It says "The folder contents could not be displayed: Error stating file 'C:/Program Files\Doom 3\darkmod\prefabs': No such file or directory" I figure I must be missing the prefab folder and all its contents. Any idea where I can get it from or where it's gone?

I tried the search tool but couldn't find anything about this. When I try to load/insert prefabs they can't be found anymore. When I started mapping it worked but not anymore. I didn't delete anything, so how can I get them back?

OK, I decided to dive into the chest prefabs and figure out how this all works. Wiki Beginner's Guide: Thankfully I've got Fidcal's beginner guide to work with, that got me 90% of the way there. Looking into Thief's Den I found the key set-up. The Wiki beginner's guide could use the used_by key_name info added. I'll leave this up to Fidcal as it's his guide, I think a note about prefabs should also be added to the very top of the section as they will all be ready to go before release and the time that authors will use the guide. However I think it's good to have the entire set-up following that incase someone wants to make a chest of their own or trouble shoot. The prefab info should be first as an author can just create the prefab and they are pretty much done. Chests Names: This is my fault. I thought chest 1, 2, and 3 would be good enough. Now that I've created a prefab I see the error in my ways. DR wants to name things with a number prefix. Hence the prefab of chest_2, chest_2_lid, chest_2_lockbar became chest_1, chest_2_lid, chest_2_lockbar as this was the first 'chest' object created in the level. So if no one objects to yet another name change it would be greatly improved to have names such as chest_metal, footlocker_wood, chest_wood. They might still get a prefix added, which will need to be removed by authors when prefab is created, but it is certianly less confusing to remove a number from a name that contains no numbers. Chest Lockbar issues (I need help here): I have set up the chest the same as the Wiki guide with one exception. Now that all the chests have a lockbox as part of the chest model I put all the 'lockbox' info on the chest itself. The chests works as it should with a key. However, when the lid is frobbed the lockbar runs thru its range of motion and bounces back to it's start position. This is when frobbing the locked chest lid and getting a locked sound. The lid stays closed and locked, the lockbar should likewise stay in the locked position. The lockbar works properly when unlocking the chest. The lockbar doesn't move when closing the chest with a key, probably because it has already bounced back to the locked position. Also, the chests didn't seem to relock when using the key to close it. However I'm just thinking of that now and may have been reopening with the key instead of just frobbing. I could not find the solution to have lockbar behave properly and NOT move when locked. Frobbing Issues: As I am starting to set this up I guess it would be a good time to go over the frob highlight. Currently I have used frobable 1 and 0 on the chest itself. Generally I am fond of having as little as possible highlight. But I am starting to think that it looks slightly odd to have onlt the lid highlight and not the rest of the chest. So I guess I have changed my previous opinion and now think that the entire chest should highlight. Opinions on this? The chest I am working on is now on SVN in prefabs. chest_2_locked_key When creating make sure the names stay chest_2... and don't have a prefix of 1 anywhere. This is temporary so don't use in a level other than for testing purposes. Once it is correct I will create prefabs of all chests.

OK, recently prefab's have come up in discussion. I believe it was in Sotha's mapping thread. This thread is to list possible prefabs, who wants to do em, which ones are done, ect... I'm too tired to go thru and list right now, I just wanted to quickly document work I've recently done towards this goal. I know Fidcal was going to do some of this. ---------------- Chests: Fidcal was waiting on me to get some lock/lockbars together so he could make prefabs. The prefab was going to contain: chest, lid, lock lever (I am adding lockboxes to the chest models), and a key (I think no lockpicks is best as that's a player inventory tool) Most likely there will be a set-up with the above mentioned for each chest model, and another set-up for lockpick use (with no picks), and yet another for an unlocked set-up. I think Fidcal will decide what is best as he sets them up. This way an author can choose chest 1/key or chest3/unlocked prefab and they won't have to mess with attaching the lid, lockbar, setting up rotation props ect... It'll also be easy to change the key/lock 3 or whatever it takes to make them work together. @Fidcal. It took longer than I thought. I was gonna make a lockbar and lockbox (fix the one I had with too large keyhole). Turned into an all day project futzing with renderbump, including shadow meshes and collision meshes of multiple types. So currently chest1 is ready to go. This uses lockbox_lever_02 (in the door_related folder), currently it seems to be black which is puzzling me because it uses the same shader as lockbox_02 which shows fine. But it does work, I just need to sort the shader prob. --EDIT-- I think lockbox_lever_o2 will work fine with chest2 Also, lockbox_01 (with lever) and lockbox_02 (both in door_related) are ready to be set-up for 'on the wall' lockbox prefabs. -RE-EDIT-- chest 3 is ready to go, also can use the same lever. So you are ready to go Fidcal Doors: At least the main door models will be set-up with handles attached and working. Possibly locked and unlocked, locked will have a key next to it. If the author creates 10 locked set-ups that use the same key # they can delete as many keys as they want. Once the prefab is created the author can then move key to desired world position. Furniture: Would be swell to have furniture set-ups that make sense. ie: Diningtable_small_bare - a small dining table, correct number of chairs, no plates/goblets, ect... Diningtable_small - same as above but with addition of plates, goblets. Again, author can delete a plate, rotate a chair, ect... to customize, alot quicker than creating each model individually. I haven't set-up doors or chests yet so it'll be great to have someone do the laymans work and I can just come thru and slap stuff in. However I will try and put some basic prefabs together myself, stuff like furniture that doesn't take any technical knowhow.

So... What was up with the forums all day yesterday..?

Alright, I've been meaning to get around to this sooner but better late than never. Fidcal and I have been working on trying to modularize a map so that it can be worked on by multiple authors, and we moved into the idea of making more modular prefabs of buildings and what not for easy insertion into any map. The purpose of this thread is to discuss and coordinate that effort. I'm far from the most knowledgeable or talented mapper around her (see: least), so lets try to come up with as many tips and ideas as possible as the start to a wiki article on the subject. I'll start out with a few ideas of Fidcals in our Hoarders thread in level editing: To expand on what he said, I think mappers should even consider doing single floors of more rectangular buildings. You could even have a bottom level, intermediate floors to be as many as needed and a roof, so the mapper could change window styles on the single pre-made floor and copy it as many times as needed and change the texture and build a building really fast. And the first obvious question for the many of you who have done such nice work so far: is any of it reusable? If so, see if it could be reasonably easily pulled out and made into a prefab. The thread is facades, but it could be houses or any other kind of building that could be plugged into a map for added variety. As Fidcal suggests, try making the building reasonably deep, at least deep enough on the side walls that it could jut out in a street or be inset equally easily. Hopefully people familiar with making premades can chime in with some hints for those of us who are less experienced. My first order of business I think will be to make a few tunnel premades from my collaboration with Fidcal, and perhaps the building that resulted (regardless if we'll actually be able to use that much of it). Feel free to chime in with some screenshots to get feedback on whether something would do well as a premade.

This is what I've been working on and almost finished. The cabinets can be modified as shown to be a sideboard, writing bureau, dresser, kitchen cabinet etc and are a looters' paradise having loads of working drawers and cupboards - one a secret compartment. Moveables can be dropped into drawers or cupboards and they work much like RL. Sometimes frob is a bit hindered but mostly OK. All are shielded by frob blockers but that is mainly so the player can't frob through the back or side once a door or drawer is open. The primary frob protection is the target_set_frobable entity which removes frobbability on anything the player puts in a cupboard or drawer. They are not as old-looking as I'd like but being brushwork they can be modified. Maybe someone can come up with better handles? The writing bureau is virtually finished but needs more testing. The matching cabinet also. The others need the frob brushes re-doing. I've put up test/cabinets.map if anyone wants to try them out but remember its still wip. The player has a light if the ones at the back are in shadow.

3 fireplace prefabs added to SVN with flames already burning in a log fire on a grate... tdm_fireplace_brick_lit.pfb tdm_fireplace_stone_lit.pfb tdm_fireplace_wood_lit.pfb New entity def for light_fireflames... A new entity def for entitydef light_fireflames added to SVN with extinguishable flickering flames with fireplace sound ready to add to your campfire etc. (note that three lit fireplace prefabs uploaded to. The light radius is probably too big imo because for some reason the settings in the def are over-ridden when added to a map.

[update] Spoke to Marcus @AMD UK on the phone and as it turns out a number of complaints have been made against "Spyre". My AMD forum account has been unbarred and my Ip address unblocked!!! Bought a new gfx card for xmas, been having issues with mainly the driver So I though a good place to look for support and polity vent etc - or so I thought My second post got flamed by some smart arse fanboy and then promptly locked, to which I reported the posted asking why it had been locked.. and then my account on there got deleted and my Ip blocked (untill the isp dhcp refreshed etc) so I cant login even with a different account name. I have emailed AMD directly about this as I did nothing wrong according the t&c's and I got no warning Pm or email from the forum mods. Now I've been over at the nVidia forums a long while back when I had the 8800GTX when I was equally frustrated when posting about the driver issue with thief etc, but at no point did a thread get locked or worse my account deleted. I don't have loyalty to AMD or nVidia but depending on the answer I get from AMD next week this card maybe going back and AMD will be added to the list of manufactures I will never buy anything from again. So whats the moral of this story, well take your pick.. [update] found cached copies of 1 of my posts Cached AMD frum link Cached AMD forum link2

when i do a search, it give me some results, I click on a result and exspect to get taken to the post it specifies - but no..... I get taken to the first post of the bloody thread it is in..ggrrr

why are they so slow this evening..??