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BEAR

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I hate to treat this place like my personal FAQ or something but this another question that has kept bugging me and clearly I'm not using the proper terms because searching here and the wiki and doom3world and their wiki has been no help. If it weren't hindering my efforts at learning this editor I wouldn't bother.

 

I want to combine a bunch of brushes (technically, stairs) into one unit that I can move around/copy. This seems really simple and its discouraging that it seems that hard to do (for me anyways). I've tried all the combine/group commands in D3ed that seem promising but I cant find that they actually do anything at all.

 

What is a good way of doing this? I thought maybe to make it into a prefab or something like that but I've never done this and it seemed there had to be an easier way to do it. Hopefully pestering threads will give answers to someone behind me.

 

It might be worthwhile asking another question here while I am at it. Another issue that seems it should be easy that has eluded me is selecting multiple brushes easily (as in not the shift+click method). It seemed there should be a drag-select method or some such thing. I've experimented with the selection menu and select touching etc but none of those really quite do it.

 

Thanks and sorry for the constant questions!

Edited by BEAR
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If there is nothing behind the brushes, you can shift-click-drag a selection box and get everything inside it. You can also create a brush that encompasses all the brushes you want, and choose "select within" which makes the new brush disappear. There are some other related options too

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If there is nothing behind the brushes, you can shift-click-drag a selection box and get everything inside it. You can also create a brush that encompasses all the brushes you want, and choose "select within" which makes the new brush disappear. There are some other related options too

 

The second one is a great idea, I had used something similar to delete large amounts of brushes (just creating a big brush over and subtracting) but I had not thought of that. Is the shit+click+drag darkradiant only? It isn't working for me in D3edit, and I tried all the possible shift/ctrl/alt/+click combination in the hopes of being able to do exactly that before posting.

 

Thanks for the tip :)

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What NH mentioned was correct, if you want to group things the only way of doing it is either moving them to their own layer (Ctrl+L to open layer manager) or converting your selection to a function_Static.

 

To add to it's own layer, first select the stuff you want to be seperate. Then hit Ctrl+L and click the "New" button. Name the layer whatever you want. Now close the layer manager by clicking the red "x". Now right click on any orthoview (Top, Left, Right etc.) and in the drop down menu move your mouse over "Move to Layer" and in the menu that pops up next to that, you should have the Default layer and the one you just made.

Now when you want to edit just the stairs, you can shut off the other layers and just work on the stairs or select all the stuff in that layer by doing what Komag suggested.

 

The other way is to make it a func_static but be warned: AI do not see func_statics, they will not walk down stairs (AFAIK) if they are func_statics because they don't know that they are there.

I always assumed I'd taste like boot leather.

 

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What NH mentioned was correct, if you want to group things the only way of doing it is either moving them to their own layer (Ctrl+L to open layer manager) or converting your selection to a function_Static.

 

To add to it's own layer, first select the stuff you want to be seperate. Then hit Ctrl+L and click the "New" button. Name the layer whatever you want. Now close the layer manager by clicking the red "x". Now right click on any orthoview (Top, Left, Right etc.) and in the drop down menu move your mouse over "Move to Layer" and in the menu that pops up next to that, you should have the Default layer and the one you just made.

Now when you want to edit just the stairs, you can shut off the other layers and just work on the stairs or select all the stuff in that layer by doing what Komag suggested.

 

The other way is to make it a func_static but be warned: AI do not see func_statics, they will not walk down stairs (AFAIK) if they are func_statics because they don't know that they are there.

 

Layers are only relevant if BEAR is using Dark Radiant, sounded like he might be using D3ED.

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Layers are only relevant if BEAR is using Dark Radiant, sounded like he might be using D3ED.

 

Sorry for ignoring your post NH, I got the email confirmation of a reply and it went strait to komag's post and I didn't think to look up.

 

Yes, I'm using D3Ed. I did download darkradiant a while back and found it was better at some things and I'm not really sure why Im using D3Ed at this point. These layers sound pretty enticing.

 

What komag said helps a good bit and I will investigate the func_static idea and see what I can do with that.

 

Thanks guys!

 

EDIT: I tried the func_static thing and that does work like a charm, is there any drawbacks to this? It seems that a func_static just in terms of a brush that sits there is about the same in effect as it as a worldspawn but I'm not an expert on the nuts and bolts of either.

Edited by BEAR
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I tried the func_static thing and that does work like a charm, is there any drawbacks to this? It seems that a func_static just in terms of a brush that sits there is about the same in effect as it as a worldspawn but I'm not an expert on the nuts and bolts of either.

You'll need to take care about your monsterclipping. AI won't be able to pathfind up a func_static stair. (For complicated stairs, monsterclipping is necessary anyway, regardless whether they're worldspawn or not.)

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A compromise I sometimes do is to temporarily combine them into a func_static so I can easily re-select the lot. (Though it is then more laborious to select one item in that group as you have to tab through.) When finished editing the whole thing I select and revert to world spawn (RMB in orthoview in DR) I have my doubts about keeping a whole stairway as func_static and then having to add monster clip - possibly building a complete new set of steps out of monster clip, which cannot of course be part of the func_static so you're back to square one. It might worth trying a single ramp of monster clip I guess.

 

But this brings to mind a notion I've had before but reluctant to keep suggesting new features for DR :) and that is to store a selection. Actually this might be added to layers - possibly add an option 'select layer' which is, after all, a group of previously selected items.

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Actually this might be added to layers - possibly add an option 'select layer' which is, after all, a group of previously selected items.

It was the plan anyway to add that "Select Layer" feature. :)

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I hate to treat this place like my personal FAQ or something but this another question that has kept bugging me and clearly I'm not using the proper terms because searching here and the wiki and doom3world and their wiki has been no help. If it weren't hindering my efforts at learning this editor I wouldn't bother.

I wouldn't worry about it; that's part of the purpose of this forum. ^_^

 

For selection, I can't believe more people don't make use of Select Complete Tall. It's the selection method I use 99% of the time. You simply draw a box around what you want and hit the button, and it will grab everything completely within the box (from ortho view down), and nothing else. In the attached image, the selection brush (red) will select ONLY brush "B" when Select Complete Tall is pressed. It's an excellent way to grab things that overlap, things that are close/touching other things, and ignore background walls, floors, ceilings, etc. I've got it hotkeyed I use it so much.

 

One more opinionated piece of advice: switch to DR. ;) While it lacks some of the capabilities of D3Ed's realtime rendering, it's vastly superior in every other way.

post-58-1211387795_thumb.jpg

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One more opinionated piece of advice: switch to DR. ;) While it lacks some of the capabilities of D3Ed's realtime rendering, it's vastly superior in every other way.

 

Seconded!

 

and since I believe I can speak for everyone else around here...

 

Thirded!

Fourthed!

Fifthed!

Sixthed!

etc!

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Well, noone mentioned it so I will.

 

A great reason to make stairs a func_static is to keep poly count low. You can add tons of polys to a room with a stairway. If that room has many lights you can really kill performance.

 

Each poly that more than one light hits drains performance. You can easily cut polys in half in a lot of situations by making stairs a func_static. That means half as many polys hit by lights, that can be huge. Monster_clip stairs are easy. They can be big blocky stairs that take no time to build and are probably a good idea on detailed staircases anyway.

Dark is the sway that mows like a harvest

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I'm somewhat baffled that the same structure that looks exactly the same has less polys as a func static than as world spawn. Does that mean if I use show tris I will see less of them? There are scores and scores of things I can make func static if that is the case.

 

Another problem though is that visportals will not work. The stair I am making will form part of the structure of the hall I am working on and separate it from the through and underneath part. Can the monster clip form part of a portal area divider?

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I'm somewhat baffled that the same structure that looks exactly the same has less polys as a func static than as world spawn. Does that mean if I use show tris I will see less of them? There are scores and scores of things I can make func static if that is the case.

 

The entity itself will not have less polys, but whereever it meets world_spawn, it will not divide the area further. So for instance if you have a staircase made of N blocks, each block would divide the floor into one more triangle where the stair meets the bottom (the same for the wall).

 

With func_static, it won't, thus you save polys.

"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man." -- George Bernard Shaw (1856 - 1950)

 

"Remember: If the game lets you do it, it's not cheating." -- Xarax

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Well Fidcal,

 

you might have to put something there for the vis_portal, or just leave that one brush worldspawn and make the rest func_static. I think you can throw a no_draw in place of that brush and your vis_portal will work.

 

You should check out bc_manor... in the maps folder.

 

I made staircases in there and played around ALOT with which brushes should be world spawn/func_static and which brushes that are func_statics should belong to the same groups.

 

For instance:

I have horizontal support beams under the second level floor. I left these worldspawn so they DO divide the terrain. The reason being was so the lights up top and in the bottom wouldn't hit the same polys.

 

The stairs themselves (the actual horizontal boards) are grouped together into func_static.

 

But the angled boards on the sides of the stairs are yet another func_static.

 

That raises the func_static count but it keeps the stairs from splitting the angled boards into a bunch of polys. Having the angled boards func_static keeps the walls very low poly.

 

Then I made all of the vertical supports one func_static, so they aren't/don't divide the other pieces up.

Dark is the sway that mows like a harvest

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Added func_static to steps and can see what you mean about less tris on sidewalls but in my case the fps actually dropped a little. I've left it in place as it's easier to remove later than add but I'll check it again at a later date when visportals and final lighting etc is in place.

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I think in your case probably what happened was what I mentioned about the horizontal support beams in my manor.

 

It's possible that your wall ceiling to floor on both levels is now 2 polys, instead of a bunch because of stair splits. So maybe the lights upsatirs now hit the same polys as the lights downstairs. Thus increasing how many lights hit a poly, which will decrease fps. I purposely let the horizontal beams split the terrain to avoid that. I actually had the same thing happen. Then I had to carefully adjust the lights so they didn't hit shared polys.

Dark is the sway that mows like a harvest

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Yeah, that fixed it - though that also falls under my theory of no overlapping light radii. Probably a bit of both. Anyway good fps increase and the lighting looks better.

 

The fps here is not bad now considering I haven't visportalled this area yet - open hallway leading to about 6 (undetailed) open rooms plus a very long corridor and some smaller ones. Course there's only one AI yet and no details added but even so, promising.

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