Any way to fix this warp mess?

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PrinceOfFunky
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Any way to fix this warp mess?

Post by PrinceOfFunky »

I'm trying to fix a room with a WarpZoneInfo at the ceiling that is supposed to warp pawns to another room which looks the same as this one, I tried to fix it in many ways making multiple maps, but even when it works, if I copy paste the portal sheets and scale them for the actual map where I need the warps it doesn't work anymore.
This is a test map where the warp B brings to a mirrored_X A, if I mirror_X B the map crashes, if I mirror_X the brushes linked to A the region colors change and so the warp won't work.
Any way to fix this problem?
EXP-WarpCeiling_10.unr
(19.1 KiB) Downloaded 29 times
edit: Also I just tried to mirror_X B instead, the warp work as expected but it's not visible and all black.
EDIT 2: Ok I tried to mirror_X the brushes linked to B and now everything work as expected, but do I really have to mirror all the brushes linked to a warp to make it work sometimes?... (I'll upload the mirrored working version.
EXP-WarpCeiling_11.unr
(18.87 KiB) Downloaded 33 times
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JackGriffin
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Re: Any way to fix this warp mess?

Post by JackGriffin »

Go around it. Use SetLocation and a touching actor to move the player where you want them to go. Warp zones go full retard for no reason occasionally.
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PrinceOfFunky
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Re: Any way to fix this warp mess?

Post by PrinceOfFunky »

JackGriffin wrote:Go around it. Use SetLocation and a touching actor to move the player where you want them to go. Warp zones go full retard for no reason occasionally.
I'm not only trying to achieve an actual warp, but an upsidedown visual effect, that's what my map is based on...
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Re: Any way to fix this warp mess?

Post by JackGriffin »

Ah ok, I see. I messed around some like this and visually the warp zones suck if there is any occlusion along the visual path. They seem to work OK if they are square and nothing can affect the line of sight to them but offset sheets like you are using where there are corners that bend 'into' the sheet fail.

I might have a not-so-clever solution. I'll PM you in case this is a major effect for your contest map.
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Re: Any way to fix this warp mess?

Post by Red_Fist »

They have to be perfect and make a new green brush sheet, make it bigger to go outside of the walls by 4 units or so, outside the subtract to make the zone.

Try that, see what happens
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PrinceOfFunky
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Re: Any way to fix this warp mess?

Post by PrinceOfFunky »

Red_Fist wrote:They have to be perfect and make a new green brush sheet, make it bigger to go outside of the walls by 4 units or so, outside the subtract to make the zone.

Try that, see what happens
Those are novice instructions, when you work with warp zones a lot the only thing you do is adding a sheet no matter whatever kind, size, rotation it has and if it doesn't work you just rotate one of the sheets, it usually works, the problem is that I'm trying to do it with an entire map ceiling.
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Re: Any way to fix this warp mess?

Post by JackGriffin »

I think this will work unless you get really close. Large mirrors do just fine and that's the very same visual effect. The only problem I see is the overhead needs to be clear of intruding BSP since you can stand past the origin of the sheet and still look at it. That could cause flickering but if that happens I'll send you a potential solution.
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PrinceOfFunky
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Re: Any way to fix this warp mess?

Post by PrinceOfFunky »

I'll type here what I sent in a PM, since I guess it can be useful for others too:
PrinceOfFunky wrote:I think the problem is caused by the BSP cuts, if the sheet passes through too many BSP cuts the warp won't work correctly, so as solution I'm using now a giant empty room on top of the ceiling and placing the sheet in that room and it works fine except for the position of the other side, maybe I just need to horizontally rotate one of the sheets.
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Re: Any way to fix this warp mess?

Post by JackGriffin »

I don't think it's the cuts themselves so much as the occlusion and BSP tree generated for the sheet/zone. You can get this same thing with large movers where they can flicker and disappear.

Also I sent this as a PM but it's a good warning to other mappers and can be a source of strange failure when working with zones, skyboxes, etc:

(I had mentioned that the default texture could not be replicating across the warpzone but I wasn't clear in what I meant. This was to clarify)
Yes, the default texture is in the texture package obviously. That's not your problem though. If you open the maps you posted and select a wall you'll see they have NO texture. The default is simply applied by the engine because the texture value is null.

What I mean about replicating is that the zone wants to show what's in the other room but when it looks to the texture of the BSP it finds there IS no texture and so it doesn't replicate a value. That's why I said you should never ever test with default texture. Unless you apply the default texture from the package yourself the texture value of the surface is not default, it's null.

That a little clearer?
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PrinceOfFunky
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Re: Any way to fix this warp mess?

Post by PrinceOfFunky »

JackGriffin wrote:I don't think it's the cuts themselves so much as the occlusion and BSP tree generated for the sheet/zone. You can get this same thing with large movers where they can flicker and disappear.

Also I sent this as a PM but it's a good warning to other mappers and can be a source of strange failure when working with zones, skyboxes, etc:

(I had mentioned that the default texture could not be replicating across the warpzone but I wasn't clear in what I meant. This was to clarify)
Yes, the default texture is in the texture package obviously. That's not your problem though. If you open the maps you posted and select a wall you'll see they have NO texture. The default is simply applied by the engine because the texture value is null.

What I mean about replicating is that the zone wants to show what's in the other room but when it looks to the texture of the BSP it finds there IS no texture and so it doesn't replicate a value. That's why I said you should never ever test with default texture. Unless you apply the default texture from the package yourself the texture value of the surface is not default, it's null.

That a little clearer?
How do you know it's None? D:
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Re: Any way to fix this warp mess?

Post by JackGriffin »

This not meant to make fun of your test map. It's an important point that developers need to understand so it saves them tremendous time in not chasing down a non-existing problem. This has been the root of an entire lost weekend trying to fix the dragons because I had this problem.

The texture on the left wall that is highlighted is your map as it sits. See how there is no texture listed on it's surface?
Def1.jpg
The texture highlighted on the right looks the same but I went in and applied the engine.defaulttexture like I would apply any other texture. You can see now that the surface returns a value for the texture.
Def2.jpg
That's why you just never tolerate default texture anywhere when working. It almost always signals a null and not 'engine.defaulttexture'. Most often in practice this means invisible actors, black zones, etc. as the game tries unsuccessfully to texture the surface.

NinjaEdit: BTW, I'm very interested in your concept now that I've gotten a peek. I really like the idea.
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PrinceOfFunky
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Re: Any way to fix this warp mess?

Post by PrinceOfFunky »

Oh I didn't know about that, ty /o\.

So, imagine a paper with a "L" drawn on it, you land it on a table and then flip the paper so that the faces have the opposite directions, the L is now mirrored(but to don't confuse with the "axis mirror" options in UT I'll keep calling this a "flip") and if you try to horizontally rotate the paper, whatever degree you rotate it the "L" will never look like an actual "L" unless you flip it again on the same axis you flipped it before.
A warp portal sheet in UT works exactly the same, the problem is that when you use the option to mirror the sheet you just flipped, the warp visual effect doesn't display level geometry but only meshes for some reason, and if you don't mirror it at all and leave it flipped then the entire geometry will be flipped, so probably the only way to fix this is to mirror the brushes on one side.

"L" and flipped "L" without using mirror option:
warptest_1.png
Both correct "L" using mirror option on one of the sheets:
warptest_2.png
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Re: Any way to fix this warp mess?

Post by Hellkeeper »

I took a look at both the original and the fixed version but I don't understand the problem you had and what was the problem, apart from the very obvious problem of your rooms being exact copies. This would work if you were linking the top of one to the bottom of the other, but you're linking the top of one to the top of the other; it will therefore be turned on its head, so its shape will be a mirror of the first one.
Also, the portal was not complete in the original map, it didn't cover the entire zone, creating a small HOM which probably didn't help.

The concept is nice, I made a map like this:
Image
You must construct additional pylons.
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PrinceOfFunky
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Re: Any way to fix this warp mess?

Post by PrinceOfFunky »

I made one too.
And in fact it was flipped, it worked cause it was a symmetric geometry (A cube in that case). I could flip every brush but then I would need to replace all the actors in the right position, in a few words a mess...
I would rather make a symmetric map, even if that would mean discarding the map I made :< .
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Re: Any way to fix this warp mess?

Post by papercoffee »

Hellkeeper wrote: The concept is nice, I made a map like this:
I love this map... but I have never tested it with jump-match what would happen if you cross the border?
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