MH-Collaboration

[Feralidragon]

And remember, you can only create about 70 zones.

63 zones to be exact (64 at all, but LevelInfo is treated like a zone too, so...)

[Myth]

I knew that there was a limit for zones, but didn't knew what was the limit. However, limited zones aren't enought to stop 64 levels.

[Feralidragon]

I knew that there was a limit for zones, but didn't knew what was the limit. However, limited zones aren't enought to stop 64 levels.

Ok, to all mappers that are about to join this colossal project (I won't participate, as I am a noob mapper, but I know some stuff that some mappers don't know).

- Avoid details like unnecessary lakes or lava zones, and try to not make different zones, unless if it is absolutelly necessary.

- All the stuff that is deco or simply pillars and stuff, try to make them as meshes, because of the node count limit (65.536).

- Try to make pathing simpliest possible, and with less navigation points possible, because there's a limit too (don't know how much, but I hit it once when I tried to make a very big map like that one).

- Try to make the BSP more cubic possible, and it's not make sh*t cubic rooms, is about to avoid strange shapes, and curved shapes as much as possible, as this avoids many BSP Holes and help to reduce node count.

- When this project finishes, if there's the possibility to zone (if you have like 50 zones in the end), try to use the last ones to zone some connected rooms that aren't, to reduce node count and possible BSP errors.

- Try to make everything possible as semi-solid (non solid for some stuff), and only turn them to solid if they have to be subtracted or if it is giving you BSP trouble.

- Remember that the UT can render faster an entire mesh than one BSP poly, but if the mesh is even 1 mile away, it is rendered, so it's time to play with the mesh actor properties: "VisibilityHeight" and "VisibilityRadius", under "Display".

- Place all the BSP snapped to grid, and size by powers of 2 (1, 2, 4, 16), and the bigger grid multiplier of the shape (16, 64, 256, 1024), less BSP problems you will have.

- Well good luck to your project

[Myth]

@Feralidragon:
You can join if you want. Map parts that don't have quality will be improved. And map parts that are inefficient, high poly will also be improved.
Don't movers have a limit? 256 or something?

@all:
Anyone found a solution to the custom monsters not attacking problem? I've tried a lot and didn't manage to fix it.

[Anderson]

so, then how are we sorting out who does what? On the zone thing, for things like water, what if we only made 1 water zone, then connected a very small subtracted cube to everything needing water? no very phesable but it could work also waht about music, isnt there some trigger, music event or something, are we going to use that for all the different areas? cause one song the whole map would be boring.

[Myth]

Zoning is my concern, don't worry about it. I'll do it as best as I can.

[Feralidragon]

@Feralidragon:
You can join if you want. Map parts that don't have quality will be improved. And map parts that are inefficient, high poly will also be improved.
Don't movers have a limit? 256 or something?

Yes, forgot about the movers

Well, even if I wanted to join, I can't, because I have in this moment to add 3 more weapons to my pack and continue my mod (modelling and scripting vehicles right now LOL)

But thanks anyway, and good luck with that big project

[Anderson]

Wait, another thing i was thinking about the zone thing, cant u just make a second zone info, like mylevel another like ZoneInfoB, when i ran out of explosion chains, i just duplicated it(The script) and made a second one and was able to continue using the new chain.

[Feralidragon]

Wait, another thing i was thinking about the zone thing, cant u just make a second zone info, like mylevel another like ZoneInfoB, when i ran out of explosion chains, i just duplicated it(The script) and made a second one and was able to continue using the new chain.

Nope, because ZoneInfo is a native object (its script is in C++).

For another hand, each zone continues to be each zone, even without any zoneinfo.

[shadow342]

Well then, just make REALLY small tunnels in between the zones (about 1 UU exept for breadth)

[Myth]

Really small tunnels can really mess up the BSP tree. It's better to make a normal sized tunnel and a semisolid to cover it.

//=============================================================================
// ZoneInfo, the built-in Unreal class for defining properties
// of zones. If you place one ZoneInfo actor in a
// zone you have partioned, the ZoneInfo defines the
// properties of the zone.
// This is a built-in Unreal class and it shouldn't be modified.
//=============================================================================

[Feralidragon]

Really small tunnels can really mess up the BSP tree. It's better to make a normal sized tunnel and a semisolid to cover it.

Yeah, but I don't think that there's a need to do that, unless you do only teleporters connecting each room, some rooms will be connected between them, right? Even with a mover (like a door) separating them, as a mover isn't in the BSP tree, it don't influenciate zoning.

I think that it's better to grab a paper to plan all the zonings in the map first. After that, you shoudn't have any problems.


[OT]Myth, Shade is asking your ReadMe ready, so he can launch the mappack [/OT]

[Myth]

Ok, I started working on the main spawning room.
Here is a screenshot:

It's anything but final.
Mapping in very low poly is actually turned out to be quite fun. What you see in the pic is only 58 polygons and 71 nodes.
I think that there are 2 key aspects in very low poly mapping:

Originality. The map isn't based anymore on eye candy, excessive amount of trims that hide away the flaws and seams or on lot of high poly brushes.

Textures. The detail is in the texture. Not in high polygon stuff, but in good usage of textures and texture mapping.

[OT]God, these offtopic tags are freaking me out...[/OT]

[Anderson]

That looks pretty cool myth! Im a fan of low poly designing, i like it very clean and simple. So how are the building parts gonna be sorted out???

[shadow342]

Hey Myth, would you mind sending me the map? I want to see what I can spice it up with .