Mapping Tips & Tricks

[[§Ŕ] ŤhěxĐâŕkśîđěŕ]

I've started a thread for tips, anyone submit any mapping tips they have (to avoid bsp, to make a nice map, etc.).

Ok I'll start...

1. NEVER use cubes as zone separators (I made a nonsolid cube w/ sides marked as portals and it worked out fine until it cut a bsp hole through half of my map... replaced with 4 sheets (from floor to ceiling) and it worked fine).

2. Intersect anything you want to substract, deintersect anything you want to add.

3. Don't fu[ch1089]k with the rebuild dialog's sliders too much for it can cause a disaster and completely fu[ch1089]k up your map beyond all recognition.

4. Avoid using reflective surfaces (translucent + mirror) near fake backdrops (I did that because I can but only once, for lulz).

5. Slice your map to pieces using zones, but don't get crazy and zone off every unit.

6. Basic geometry goes first (use "Set ZoneInfo AmbientBrightness 255 | Flush" while playing through"), then basic lights, then detail geometry, then fine lighting and finally items and enemies (but make sure you leave enough room for everything).

7. Save before rebuild!

8. Keep multiple copies of your map so if you fu[ch1089]k something up, you can easily revert (like I keep at least 100 snapshots of my virtual PC where I code).

9. Do not rebuild paths until final rebuild.

10. Do *NOT* rebuild paths until final rebuild!

11. However, if you *DO* rebuild paths every time you rebuild your map (because you didn't know this before, hurf durf), select all Inventory, Pawn, Keypoint (?) and NavigationPoint (sub)classes, right click one of the selected actors and select Order -> To Last. That will sink reachspecs like Titanic sunk itself (lol fail).

12. Before you add or substract a brush, look at it for god's sake... If it's additive and sinking into floor and you don't want it to, deintersect it (and if it's substractive and is hanging in mid-air, intersect it). If it's pointing out somewhere it shouldn't, make a test room, do (de)intersection(s) there and add/substract it into your map afterwards.

13. (optional) Delete all test rooms and test brushes before releasing your map (if you want to keep your brushes for later lulz, keep a copy of your map with them for yourself).

14. (optional) Add music and ambient sounds into your map if it's not a very silent map (like underwater or something) to keep it interesting.

15. (optional, recommended) Add eye candy. Small semi-solids, Decorations, Emitters, etc. However, do not add too much or it'll generate bad bsp/big file (except if you have a leet upload speed of over 9000 Mbps and a magic wand - no homo).

16. USE 227'S FEATURES GOD DAMNIT! These guys are working hard on this stuff and it's not to be left out... If you make a map without 227's features using 227's editor, then YOU FAIL, PERIOD you should make one, lol. (In case you didn't know, 227's features are extremely sexy...Emitters, Distance Fog, Woodruff and everything else.

17. (recommended to required) Play through your map at least 100 times after you make the "final" version and get some beta testers, because you don't want to release a broken map. Or you want...whatever.

That'd be all for now, if I remember something else I'll edit this post or make a new one. Please contribute your tips & tricks as well.

EDIT: Wow, longpost is looooong... Please read everything and add anything I may have left out.

EDIT^2: Lol, this is going into wiki, NAO.

[Hellkeeper]

18. If it's a surface and if it's flat, it could probably use more decoration.

[Pyro]

19. Don't use Fake Backdrop to Unlit! Use Fake Backdrop to display a skybox, and use Unlit to Unlit.

[(T:S:B)Legionnaire]

20. Don't let sheets and semi-solids colide
21. Don't let semi-solids collide with other semi-solids
22. ALWAYS make sheets non-solid
23. If a certain brush is giving u bsp problems, turn it into a mover. this is always an alternative that usually works pretty well
24. If u have a bsp somewhere, extract a cube THROUGH the bsp hole (eg. dimension 2x2x1024) which then leads to another huge cube (like 1024x1024x1024), this might also fix a bsp
25. If u want to avoid bsps, in the rebuild option, always select Optimal. slider usually gives best results in between 5 and 15.
26. If u have any actors (decoration, pickup, etc) which is moving with a brush, make sure that bStatic is False in the advanced options, otherwise the map will crash online

[Hellkeeper]

22. ALWAYS make sheets non-solid

Since sheets are always non-solid, this is totally useless...

[Age]

22. ALWAYS make sheets non-solid

Always make non-zoneportal sheets Semisolid.

27. Make every custom stuff and texture in MyLevel.

[[§Ŕ] ŤhěxĐâŕkśîđěŕ]

27. Make every custom stuff and texture in MyLevel.

Well not every... If you have a map pack that has similar textures or an actor used in all maps, put it into a separate package. However if you have something like a texture with some text on it (i.e. a sign), put it into MyLevel.

[[]KAOS[]Casey]

translation : shit is situational

[Pravin]

Well, to minimize BSP errors, I suggest turning the slider to "minimize cuts. The reason for this is fewer cuts mean that it's less likely for any given cut to cause an error, whereas if you choose an option closer to balance tree, more cuts will be unnecessarily made to balance the binary tree of collisions. There's a reason for this, but that reason is no longer valid on today's machines. I'd leave it at the current setting and lower the slider towards minimize cuts if things start getting ugly.

[[§Ŕ] ŤhěxĐâŕkśîđěŕ]

Well, to minimize BSP errors, I suggest turning the slider to "minimize cuts. The reason for this is fewer cuts mean that it's less likely for any given cut to cause an error, whereas if you choose an option closer to balance tree, more cuts will be unnecessarily made to balance the binary tree of collisions. There's a reason for this, but that reason is no longer valid on today's machines. I'd leave it at the current setting and lower the slider towards minimize cuts if things start getting ugly.

Yeah, I never used "balance tree" but I noticed that more I move the slider to there, more sh*t starts happening so I leave it low.

[Hellkeeper]

I noticed that if you build properly, it's never useful to touch the sliders

[KillerSkaarj]

According to Dots, it's actually possible to light a map the size of the grid without using zonelights with the DistanceLightActor (yes, he told me about it in my thread and yes, I used it )

[Moke]

These Tips are pretty useful thanks for them.

[creavion]

22. ALWAYS make sheets non-solid

Always make non-zoneportal sheets Semisolid.

27. Make every custom stuff and texture in MyLevel.

True, if I look in maps like Aztec I wonder about the many sheets on the lake there, you know with those uhm how are they called? .. lilypads or so?
However if I make those thingies in my maps non-solid, I get evil bsp errors mostly already after a short time. BSP Holes or even not working zoneportals.
In thise case I have to convert the non-solid deco brush to a semi or a solid one, whatever fits more considering the geometry stabilization.
I would say epic did not used the Editor rebuilder for rebuilding, instead I could imagine they used something different, maybe an extern bsp-compiler or so.

To the myLevel thing: Well, a question from me now, but isn`t it true, that UnrealEd 1 (Unreal) does not know MyLevel (ok unless you apply the newest oldunreal patch).

[[§Ŕ] ŤhěxĐâŕkśîđěŕ]

To the myLevel thing: Well, a question from me now, but isn`t it true, that UnrealEd 1 (Unreal) does not know MyLevel (ok unless you apply the newest oldunreal patch).

Maybe, I used to get "Cannot find file for package MyLevel" errors in certain circumstances.