Geometry not grid perfect

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Koei

L4: Comfortable Member
Feb 23, 2008
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The geometry on my map isn't perfect. I have walls that I have to move with a 1px grid. What is the effect of this on optimizing?
 

YM

LVL100 YM
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Dec 5, 2007
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It will probably send your map to the grave, I suggest you set aside a whole day and work your way though your map putting all your brushes to the biggest grid size you can get away with, if it is a really small brush in all three dimentions then you probably want to func_detail it.
You always want to have the grid in 16 32 or 8 if you can, untill of course you need to put detailed brushes in that are smaller. Again, you should always be very carefull how you place brushes, make sure they line up to each other and the grid when you place them so that you don't have to worry about it later
 

Koei

L4: Comfortable Member
Feb 23, 2008
186
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I was afraid of that :). Gonna have to do some serious fixing (luckily still in early stage). And what about sizing of walls? 510px wall (for example) is bad right?
 

Armadillo of Doom

Group Founder, Lover of Pie
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Oct 25, 2007
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I had the same problem when I first started. I find that as the map progresses, I invariably move to a smaller grid. Starting small makes it nigh impossible to make the nice detail geometry later on. Do all your walls size 32, and go from there.
 

Koei

L4: Comfortable Member
Feb 23, 2008
186
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And what about wall lengths, heights? What sizes should I use? 1024, 512, 256, 64, 8? Because of texture scaling (from 1024x1024)? Multiples of 8? 16? 32?
 

YM

LVL100 YM
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Dec 5, 2007
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no multiples of 8, powers of 2 (can be added together i guess)

2 4 8 16 32 64 128 256 512 1024....

Walls should generally be 16 units thick unless you have a reason for making them otherwise. Height depends on the room but generally 128 - 512 (using multiples of 64 usually) The compile tools just find it easier to cut up your map if everything is nice sizes and aligned to the right grid size.
 

Koei

L4: Comfortable Member
Feb 23, 2008
186
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Sweet, thanks. Now there is nothing to stop me from winning that GPU :D. Actually, those are all multiples of 8.....128*8=1024 ;).
 

YM

LVL100 YM
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Dec 5, 2007
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2 and 4 arent multiples of 8 but are used quite a lot if you want to nitpick :p
and even if it as multiples of something it would be 16 not 8 ;)
 

Geuel

L1: Registered
Feb 28, 2008
49
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It will probably send your map to the grave, I suggest you set aside a whole day and work your way though your map putting all your brushes to the biggest grid size you can get away with, if it is a really small brush in all three dimentions then you probably want to func_detail it.
You always want to have the grid in 16 32 or 8 if you can, untill of course you need to put detailed brushes in that are smaller. Again, you should always be very carefull how you place brushes, make sure they line up to each other and the grid when you place them so that you don't have to worry about it later

Could you please clarify and/or expand on this? Do you mean a bigger grid as in what you change with the [ and ] keys?

And what would be the disadvantages of using a "smaller" grid?
 

Elvis666

L1: Registered
Feb 24, 2008
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Apparently using a smaller grid (eg 1, 2, 4) makes the compiling process harder and may or may not result in leaks. (correct me if I'm wrong)

Plus if you have things on a larger grid, you won't have to zoom in as much in Hammer... :p

edit: oh! And yes, you get smaller/bigger grid with [ & ].
 

Geuel

L1: Registered
Feb 28, 2008
49
7
Apparently using a smaller grid (eg 1, 2, 4) makes the compiling process harder and may or may not result in leaks. (correct me if I'm wrong)

Plus if you have things on a larger grid, you won't have to zoom in as much in Hammer... :p

edit: oh! And yes, you get smaller/bigger grid with [ & ].

Is it only the compiling process that suffers, by which I would assume you mean it takes longer?

I would also think this would only cause leaks because if you're zoomed far out with a larger grid, you wouldn't notice a leak. Is this correct?
 

MangyCarface

Mapper
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Feb 26, 2008
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Simply using a smaller grid does not cause longer compile times. To the compiler a line is a line, it doesn't care how wide. However a symptom of using smaller grids is MORE LIKELY to cause YOU to make errors. So, you can safely make a map with 1 unit grids, but it's much easier to make mistakes and therefore cause the compiler to go nuts.
 

Koei

L4: Comfortable Member
Feb 23, 2008
186
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Okay, but texture scaling still suffers from weird wall sizes i guess.
 

Koei

L4: Comfortable Member
Feb 23, 2008
186
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Like how should I handle this? Which is preferred? And what if it was a floor at the bottom of a level, if it was 1block thick?

preferyn6.png



edit: or I could just put the walls on the floor >_<.
But I really prefer the 2nd picture, that way I can make the floor exactly 1024x1024 and the walls 1024x512 (wxh). But I'm worried about problems with compiling or lighting because the wall and floor would only hit on 1 point instead of a full edge.
 
Last edited:

Paria

L5: Dapper Member
Dec 12, 2007
202
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your second example is just fine, it they touch, the map wont leak dosent matter that they dont cover the corners at all. I actually prefer using the 2nd example.

And unless your floor has a specific requirement to be 1 unit think just make it the same size as the walls, 16 units is a decent starting size for walls /floors / roofs,