TDM People! Something for you all to check out!

[Renzatic]

I saw this and immediately thought of you all here.

 

Trenchbroom!

 

That's right. It's an incredibly slick, extremely intuitive BSP editor for Quake 1. Yeah, Quake. Old game. But being a Quake editor does mean it has something in common with Radiant. Plus the source code is freely available, which means it might be possible to incorporate some of the nicer features into DR.

 

Just from my perspective, it looks like doing so would be a huge boon to level design. This makes the process of level design more immediate and free flowing. It acts more like a proper 3D editor, rather than the slow block by block setup of DR and Dromed.

 

I'm gonna play around with it a little bit to see how it works, but just from the video and a quick glance through the documentation, it already looks pretty grand.

Edited March 12, 2013 by Renzatic

[Baddcog]

the part at the start where they make terrain out of triangles is a cool technique, guess that carries over from the old days. But with patches...

 

might be cool if you need a sharp angled look specifically, but aligning textures on angles faces in DR is ugly, if not impossible.

 

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3d view ONLY? UGHHHH. Wings3d was like that, hated it.

 

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Don't really see the purpose to use it though. DR works pretty sweet as is.

[Obsttorte]

I'm also not a big friend of 3D only, as I do most of my work in the 2D windows. Anyways, being able to manipulate patches in a more extensive way then it is possible now would definetely be a big plus.

 

Regarding the "all day worksteps" like creating or cutting brushes it doesn't seem to be faster then DR to me.

[nbohr1more]

I think the intention is that some of the GUI abilities in Trenchbroom be considered for 3D editing options in DR.

 

I suppose that a PM to Orbweaver would be the way to go as I don't believe anyone else is doing DR development (unless Obsttorte is planning

on contributing there...)

[Obsttorte]

(unless Obsttorte is planning

on contributing there...)

[nbohr1more]

Heh.

 

I know you helped fix the vertex save bug... so?

 

No pressure of course...

[Sotha]

I sometimes manipulate things in the 3d view in DR. Clumsy as hell. This quake editor looks a bit 'gamey' and easy so it may attract people in that way.

 

In reality, I think, making sealing geometry without leaks with 3d only view would be very difficult.

 

Then again, I agree that 2d views reduce thinking more into 2d rather than 3d. Luckily in DR that can be overcome by examining the camera 3d view occasionally.

[demagogue]

Interesting, but 2d is usually fine for bsp imo.

I do think we could use more architectural func_statics models. That's what artistically distinguishes the really great-looking games recently. But that goes beyond this editor; you still have to go to a modeler for that.

[Renzatic]

I work mostly in a 3D perspective these days, which is one of the reasons why this appealed to me. Though I do agree that it shouldn't be the sole way to work on your maps, since there will always be occasions when you need to compare and contrast something from the 2D windows.

 

The one thing I liked about this though is that it makes BSP editing more like using a 3D editor. It brings vertices to the front, rather than something that's something clumsily implemented and tucked away behind the scenes. With high end editors becoming more and more necessary these days, having an ingame editor that mimics them a little more closely would not only make some things easier to do, but could also help prime new people into using them later. The closer DR is to something like Blender, Lightwave, or Max, the easier it will be for people to transition to them later when they really start needing them.

 

Dark Radiant mixed with some of the best features from Trenchbroom would be a pretty nice thing, you gotta admit.

[Baddcog]

I admit I didn't look into it with great detail, but vert editing in DR is pretty simple, how much easier could it be?

 

What are the best features of Techbroom IYO?

[Renzatic]

I admit I didn't look into it with great detail, but vert editing in DR is pretty simple, how much easier could it be?

 

What are the best features of Techbroom IYO?

 

Admittedly, I haven't played much with DR, and I'm basing most of my experience with the direct editing portion of it on my time with plain old D3Radiant, but...

 

The one biggest feature I can see is being able to select multiple brushes (and/or patches in TDM's case), and being able to edit them as one object. One thing I remember hating back in my Radiant days was if I wanted to make something specific out of, say, three patches, I'd have to grab one, edit it, grab the other, edit it to match, grab the third, repeat. It made things more time consuming than what it should've been.

 

Also, being able to select edges and faces is a huge, huge thing in terms of D3 editing. It's one of those things that makes it more akin to editing in LW and it's ilk.

 

I still haven't had a chance to play with it yet (can't find my damn Quake 1 disc), so I can't say how much better or worse it is, but these features alone make it a pretty big deal to me.

[Baddcog]

Well, you can grab multi-patches/brushes now and vert edit them all at once now.

 

Can't select by edges/faces but not that much harder than selecting two verts, though I guess it would be a nice feature. But from that vid it looked like he was just grabbing the verts, not the faces. Maybe the selected brushes were highlighting red, but I don't think he was selecting them.

 

Guess I don't expect too much from a BSP editor since it's all fairly basic terrain anyway. One thing I'd like from Hammer is the ability to paint patches/textures. Painting can be a little easier than editing verts for natural terrain (though not that much- it has issues too). But being able to paint material fades would be fantastic addition to TDM.

[zergrush]

Frankly, the 3D view thing could make things a little easier and more attractive to new mappers. Would be cool if DR had something like that, although the 2D views will always remain essential.

[RPGista]

Hmmmm... Maybe you guys just got used to radiant? There are many ways of making 3d editting easier that are not present in the cureent doom editors. Of course that wont actually KEEP you from making complex stuff regardless, but the amount of work involved can vary a lot depending on what mechanics is available. Compare editting patches point by point to create a terrain, and CoD's radiant that allows for soft move of vertex, as well as 3d painting and manual texture blending. The most important features missing from a map editor are relative references, snapping and drawing on faces + push/pull capabilites - thats mostly of what a very popular modeler called Sketchup is based upon, and it simply makes ortho views obsolete for almost all practical purposes. Ive done my time in DR, it gets the job done, but if you tell me you like staring at ortho views rendered in wireframe, you might love 3d a bit too much.

Edited March 14, 2013 by RPGista

[demagogue]

Can you weld verts in DR? I've always wanted to just highlight 2 verts, push 'w', & then they're connected. It'd make patch editing terrain or like a cave much easier.

[RPGista]

I dont think you can... Patches (nurbs) are a bore with the whole tangency issues... Heres a video of an easy way of modeling in 3D, by using reference locks (inferences), snaps and measurement inputs you basicly dont need to leave perspective view and can work quite fast.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=OPkv9tRuO-c

 

I remember a map modeler that was looking quite interesting too, modeling wise. I believe it was even based on radiant? It was a while ago... Still, I would rather have CoD Radiant's triagulated mesh plans, soft move and texture painting before anything else...

[teddybear]

Hi,

If someone is interesting for mapping and texturing with trenchbroom, i found something interesting.

1 - Extract the zip in your TrenchBroom\games

2 - Configure your Darkmod folder in games settings.

Now you can see the texture in your texture browser.

https://zupimages.net/viewer.php?id=22/13/xwm8.jpg

3 - Make a room and texture it.

4 - Save your map and open it with notepad++

5 - Delete line 6 ( "_tb_textures" .... ) and all the _ed with replace fonction.

6 - now import the map in DR, add light + player start and compile.

Done.

thedarkmod.zip

[datiswous]

2 hours ago, teddybear said:

If someone is interesting for mapping and texturing with trenchbroom

Would the D3 port of Trenchboom possibly be a better version?

https://github.com/RobertBeckebans/TrenchBroom

[xaGe]

Here is my version of that fixed up, added dds missing from the texture support. Make sure you are using a minimum build of TrenchBroom 2021.1 to use it.

 

thedarkmod.zip

Edited March 28, 2022 by xaGe

[teddybear]

@datiswous

Oh interesting! thx

 

Edited March 28, 2022 by teddybear

[xaGe]

1 hour ago, datiswous said:

Would the D3 port of Trenchboom possibly be a better version?

https://github.com/RobertBeckebans/TrenchBroom

That only supports Doom3BFG AFAIK. Is that what the TDM is based on?

[HMart]

8 minutes ago, xaGe said:

 Is that what the TDM is based on?

No it was based on original idtech4 but has since changed way beyond it.

[nbohr1more]

If if works with BFG it should work with TDM since RBDoom3BFG supports unpacked vanilla Doom 3 style assets.

The open question is whether it works with pk4 and I would expect it to.

Time to try it, I guess...

[xaGe]

TrenchBroom already works fine with pk4.

[teddybear]

33 minutes ago, nbohr1more said:

If if works with BFG it should work with TDM since RBDoom3BFG supports unpacked vanilla Doom 3 style assets.

The open question is whether it works with pk4 and I would expect it to.

Time to try it, I guess...

Not working, the map file format is not the same, and DR cannot open it.