Forced to use Hammer?

[MacNetron]

Okay, I used Hammer now for a couple of weeks.
Can't say I love this tool. Even working in the good ol' UnrealEd (back in the days of Unreal Tournament) was easier to me.

So, are we forced to use Hammer? Is there a possibility to use something else?
I ask because this summer I tried Blender a while. (Then TF2 came out and no more Blender...).
Blender has a very intuitive interface. Works like charm. But is not made for Source of course.

Anybody knows of some export filters or something like that??

 

[Shmitz]

Well, for one, Blender is a modeling program, not a mapping program. There is a significant enough difference in features to warrant a distinction.

Hammer used to be Worldcraft, which was one of the worst map editors made for quake-style engines. Why valve chose it for their source engine editor has always been beyond me. As far as I'm aware, you have to use Hammer, given how tied it is now to source. I would love to be wrong, though.

 

[Fragimus_Max]

Hammer really isn't all that bad. Worldcraft was far worse.

I would guess that, either way, you would have to process the final work with Hammer anyway. It's not just a mapping tool, but it also compiles the proprietary map format for Source.

 

[Hawk]

I felt the same way at first, since I've always been accustomed to building game levels in Maya. But I've come to terms with Hammer. For what is required, it gets the job done. And eventually you get quite used to it. I'm just about sure there is no alternative map-building software for Source.

 

[YM]

I have only ever used hammer and find it totaly intuative, if that is the right spelling of that tricky word. I'm not sure why people say its so rubbish, I know certain things are a little tricky and require a fair bit of though, like displacements but surely that holds true for all editors? can you explain to me why hammer isnt so good?

 

[Shmitz]

I will agree that Worldcraft was far worse, and that despite my grievances, Hammer is a huge improvement.

However...

can you explain to me why hammer isnt so good?

It still has a terrible vertex manipulation tool. I've used plenty of editors with better feedback for when you've created an invalid brush and that let you undo individual vertex movements.

The clip tool is crap as well. Sure it's fine if all you want to do is angle a brush on the XY plane, the XZ plane, or the YZ plane. If you want to clip anything to a plane that slopes on all three axes, though, you're screwed. Just about every other editor I can remember using since Q2 allows you to place a third clipping point. I have no idea why Hammer still doesn't.

Which means unless you want to create only rectangular boxes, you have three options for brush manipulation: 1) a frustrating tool, 2) a limited tool, and 3) ... carve.

 

[Haas]

i used blender a lot and i also am expierience autocad 3d drawer and other technical 3d programs.
And serious hammer is really really bad!
I think autocad is 10 times better for making maps and i see no problem in using it. But autocad is very expensive program and is in development since the 1982 so i can see why it is not used because it is out of reach even the quality is something that hammer will never get to.
What i can not see is why i can import dxf files (autocad format) but can not import dxf files ? :S
Why hammer is so bad:
Unstabel
Snap to grid works bad.
No dimension editing.
You can't edit blocks (you can edit all blocks with the ig function on.) But likein autocad if you press twice on a block it get on a next level and you only see the block your editing.
No linked blocks. Like you should copy a certain block like a jump and if you update block 1 all blocks linked update to that first one. (i think you can work around this if some one knows how would be sweet if you can explain how to)
Saved views like vigroups but then in presets if you go to tab 2 you have a view with the visgroups you wanted.
Help lines that are infinit length you can make level borders or align other brushes/models to it.
Mouse gestures
Auto snap to brush vertexs.
Show xyz axes so you can work in 3d mode (select x axes to move over x axes.
And then a cut feature that will not kill your map.
Can go on for a while here
Infinti zoom so you can see if a point is really on the grid

 

[A Boojum Snark]

Show xyz axes so you can work in 3d mode (select x axes to move over x axes.

Infinti zoom so you can see if a point is really on the grid

Hit X while your mouse is in the 3D view to activate 3D manipulation.

You can go to 256x zoom... I can't see how you would need closer in that that :confused1:

 

[Nizzem]

I really haven't had problems with hammer stability on my machine. I do agree that the carve, clip and vertex editing are very lackluster and could be heavily improved on.

 

[DJive]

I really haven't had problems with hammer stability on my machine. I do agree that the carve, clip and vertex editing are very lackluster and could be heavily improved on.

Same. I don't like hammer, im a HUGE GTKradient fan, that to me was leaps over hammer, how i wish i could use that =( For all the reasons you just mentioned is why i loved GTKradient

 

[Haas]

My hammer always I say always crashes when I have ignore groups selected and then with the properties manager open I select a brush entity. (poef says hammer)
If I have the properties manager closed and I open it after I selected it the brush entity doesn't show as an entity only a normal brush....
I worked with solidworks inventor 3dsmax blender autocad and duke nukem 3d map editor.
And hammer looks most to the duke nukem 3d map editor

 

[Hawk]

That Duke 3D map editor sure was great back in the day. Now that you mention it, it is similar in certain ways.

 

[shpladoink]

For ease of use in importing custom assets, I've found that the Unreal 3 Editor is far more user-friendly than Hammer. More drag and drop rather than the two-plugin-and-six-different-filetypes-for-each-model deal that is Hammer's choice. To be honest, I have yet to successfully import a model into Hammer.

 

[MacNetron]

Looks like we are stuck to Hammer then
Nevertheless, I was just curious if there was an alternate solution. I will try harder instead to get used to the tool. Best way is probably using it often.

When I'm completely bored I'll might have a look to the possibility to export from Blender to a vmf-file. The vmf-file looks like plain text to me. Hammer can load it and compile...
But be warned, I first have to be completely bored

 

[Brandished]

I saw this tutorial on fpsbanana a few days ago, I haven't tried whats suggested there, though.

Source level creation with Gmax
http://www.fpsbanana.com/tuts/5116

 

[Nizzem]

You may want to look in to this, I'm pretty sure you can import and export VMF with this program and you may find it easier to work with then hammer.

Although I haven't tried it myself, I did use it to get the geometry from a VMF into 3ds Max.

 

[Brandished]

There's also QuArK (Quake Army Knife) http://quark.planetquake.gamespy.com

See:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TovgpwFQX_g

Forgot a link...
Setup thread here: http://www.dark-forge.com/forums/index.php?topic=13.0