[GUIDE] Scale and your map.
- Thread starter grazr
- Start date
Eeh, stickies never get read. Its better for it not be one, though it definatly could!
It'd be nice to get it stickied, it's certianly one of my less subjective and more raw informative articles.
I recently found my original images so i can replace them so that they can actually be read. Even though photobucket doesn't appear to believe i have exceeded my bandwidth, after a couple of generic TF2 google searches these images were quite popular, occupying the first, second and third pages of TF2 related image searches. :/
vs
I recently found my original images so i can replace them so that they can actually be read. Even though photobucket doesn't appear to believe i have exceeded my bandwidth, after a couple of generic TF2 google searches these images were quite popular, occupying the first, second and third pages of TF2 related image searches. :/
vs
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- Apr 29, 2008
- 1,068
- 709
Dude, just go and get dropbox already, and host your images in your own public folder.
Use that^ link and we both get an extra 250mb free.
Use that^ link and we both get an extra 250mb free.
I prefer Imageshack because there's no limit. At all. Ever. And it doesn't cut into your space for hosting other stuff. You just have to know how to link the raw file afterward (which they do let you do; they just make it intentionally confusing).
Imageshack has a penchant for randomly deleting images or inadvertently hosting spyware (at least once to my knowledge). If you want a free, fast host, use Imgur. If you want something more accessible and editable, let someone refer you to dropbox. If you want to be hardcore, just buy some damn web hosting.
REEJ
L420: High Member
- Aug 26, 2010
- 437
- 176
Great article. It surely cleared up some doubts I had, especialy about heights. I'm used to hl2dm heights and distances, which are a bit diferent, and usualy a bit smaller.
But what about interior heights? This is what always gets me confused. I never know what exactly to do with walls heights when making a two story interior, and depending on the type of building I can get even more confused.
For a simple house I guess I can stick to 192, since door frames are 128, but for an industrial or spytech, or any building that is supposedly larger than a humble house I often don't know what heights to choose from. Especially when I try to add balconies or certain elevations that give way into a top floor.
But what about interior heights? This is what always gets me confused. I never know what exactly to do with walls heights when making a two story interior, and depending on the type of building I can get even more confused.
For a simple house I guess I can stick to 192, since door frames are 128, but for an industrial or spytech, or any building that is supposedly larger than a humble house I often don't know what heights to choose from. Especially when I try to add balconies or certain elevations that give way into a top floor.
I guess what you're getting at is when you create a floor, you have to position that 32/16 unit thick brush on either the top of the first floor's 256 texture or the bottom of the second floor's texture alignment.
The short answer is it goes at the top part of the first floors alignment as it makes it easier to align stairs and TF2 textures have more dirt trims at the base than top parts of wall textures; making it easier to align textures as well.
The long answer is that the interesting thing about TF2 is everything seems to be done by 64 units. So you're not stuck with conformative sizes such as strictly 256 units height. Floors are often set at 0/64/128 units height from the base floor. Many wall textures will come with one or two accompanying 256 texture segments to go above it.
see:
metal/wall016 + metal/wall016a
metal/wall029 + metal/wall029a + metal/wall029b
E.G.
Most trims are 16 units wide (some are 8), Also the wall texture planks are usually 16 wide, this allows you to keep a certain assemblance to a rigid alignment regime.
The short answer is it goes at the top part of the first floors alignment as it makes it easier to align stairs and TF2 textures have more dirt trims at the base than top parts of wall textures; making it easier to align textures as well.
The long answer is that the interesting thing about TF2 is everything seems to be done by 64 units. So you're not stuck with conformative sizes such as strictly 256 units height. Floors are often set at 0/64/128 units height from the base floor. Many wall textures will come with one or two accompanying 256 texture segments to go above it.
see:
metal/wall016 + metal/wall016a
metal/wall029 + metal/wall029a + metal/wall029b
E.G.
Most trims are 16 units wide (some are 8), Also the wall texture planks are usually 16 wide, this allows you to keep a certain assemblance to a rigid alignment regime.
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Well, I sorta had that doubt too. And I confirmed it in a few maps. Thanks.
But after trying to build more stuff I realized my problem is really more with the ceilings (and 2nd floor floors - which you already covered a bit now). Wall height is just another thing that comes with it.
I often ask myself what ceiling height to make in certain situations. When I refered to the two story interiors, my real problem was what height to give the 1st floor and what height to give the 2nd. Probably the same height, but what height?
As I understand, heights are the same inside and outside, 128, 192, 256, etc, but what's the appropriate height for a certain hallway or room is what gets me scratching my head. I've been observing some maps and I've come up with a mix of more confusion and a bit of elucidation.
(I think my problem is also related to me being used to hl2 dimentions, which relied much on 128 tall ceilings. Here, everything is slightly bigger.)
Just a few examples:
- 2Fort's intel rooms have diferent ceiling heights in both exits. One of the exits (the lower ceiling one) gets higher after turning the corner. The intel room itself is even higher. I can't get the meaning of it. Only thought that maybe it's best to make 256 in places where we might add much detail, like in the intel room. But then... looking better, the ceiling there is 304 tall, not 256 as I had expected.
Entrance halways are 176 tall, which makes the upper floor be 192 high. I think I see the connection there, and this fits what you just told me about 2nd floor height. But what made them choose 192, is still a mistery to me.
The storage shelf to the left of the main spawn is only 160 high, maybe this is arbitrary?
The basement resuply entrace is only 128 high. The inside is 224. The entrance height may be to conform with the door model or the cave displacements.
- Gorge made me think that maybe a good height for an industrial building is 256 for both floors, but the second floor ceiling often gets much lower with all the details and props than the first floor.
Then I found a room unnaccessible to the player that has 160 ceiling height. This means this one is on a 32 grid.
I forgot some others I have seen...
Maybe this is all a bit arbitrary, depending on concept design, or maybe I lack a few basic concepts of architecture, and decoration too, perhaps. I don't know. I'll keep looking at maps and maybe I can find a pattern or something else that may help.
But after trying to build more stuff I realized my problem is really more with the ceilings (and 2nd floor floors - which you already covered a bit now). Wall height is just another thing that comes with it.
I often ask myself what ceiling height to make in certain situations. When I refered to the two story interiors, my real problem was what height to give the 1st floor and what height to give the 2nd. Probably the same height, but what height?
As I understand, heights are the same inside and outside, 128, 192, 256, etc, but what's the appropriate height for a certain hallway or room is what gets me scratching my head. I've been observing some maps and I've come up with a mix of more confusion and a bit of elucidation.
(I think my problem is also related to me being used to hl2 dimentions, which relied much on 128 tall ceilings. Here, everything is slightly bigger.)
Just a few examples:
- 2Fort's intel rooms have diferent ceiling heights in both exits. One of the exits (the lower ceiling one) gets higher after turning the corner. The intel room itself is even higher. I can't get the meaning of it. Only thought that maybe it's best to make 256 in places where we might add much detail, like in the intel room. But then... looking better, the ceiling there is 304 tall, not 256 as I had expected.
Entrance halways are 176 tall, which makes the upper floor be 192 high. I think I see the connection there, and this fits what you just told me about 2nd floor height. But what made them choose 192, is still a mistery to me.
The storage shelf to the left of the main spawn is only 160 high, maybe this is arbitrary?
The basement resuply entrace is only 128 high. The inside is 224. The entrance height may be to conform with the door model or the cave displacements.
- Gorge made me think that maybe a good height for an industrial building is 256 for both floors, but the second floor ceiling often gets much lower with all the details and props than the first floor.
Then I found a room unnaccessible to the player that has 160 ceiling height. This means this one is on a 32 grid.
I forgot some others I have seen...
Maybe this is all a bit arbitrary, depending on concept design, or maybe I lack a few basic concepts of architecture, and decoration too, perhaps. I don't know. I'll keep looking at maps and maybe I can find a pattern or something else that may help.
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There's no real meaning to it. I get your frustration i had trouble converting the scales when i moved from HL2 to TF2, scale was a real problem for me; and this is what i've learnt.
2fort is a small map so you can take those scales and tell yourself these are your minimum room sizes you should ever try. Any room over 256 in height is usually just so that the author could throw in additional detail at that level or because he wants's rocket jumpers to have a good time. These scales are unique to CTF and 2fort though and you should really consider larger sizes for other game modes because most classes, particularly the scout, require more horizontal space to perform properly and this usually means making the ceilings taller as well to keep room sizes appriately preportioned. I really think you're thinking about this too much.
128 is too small and you should never really use it unless you want a particular route to be easily defended; explosives will pin people against the ceiling and into corners making spam too powerful of a tactic. 192 is fine because it gives some room and allows players to jump around and get knocked about by explosive knock back; it also means players on higher ground above them can engage at close distances where falloff doesn't hit it's half-damage scale (around 256 units).
256 is what you should be using for the sake of texture alignment and multistory buildings. They'll align and tile properly on the outside and the floor being where i said it should go is at its least intrusive; and as i said, stairs will align better to this setup so you really should use this over anything else.
2fort is a small map so you can take those scales and tell yourself these are your minimum room sizes you should ever try. Any room over 256 in height is usually just so that the author could throw in additional detail at that level or because he wants's rocket jumpers to have a good time. These scales are unique to CTF and 2fort though and you should really consider larger sizes for other game modes because most classes, particularly the scout, require more horizontal space to perform properly and this usually means making the ceilings taller as well to keep room sizes appriately preportioned. I really think you're thinking about this too much.
128 is too small and you should never really use it unless you want a particular route to be easily defended; explosives will pin people against the ceiling and into corners making spam too powerful of a tactic. 192 is fine because it gives some room and allows players to jump around and get knocked about by explosive knock back; it also means players on higher ground above them can engage at close distances where falloff doesn't hit it's half-damage scale (around 256 units).
256 is what you should be using for the sake of texture alignment and multistory buildings. They'll align and tile properly on the outside and the floor being where i said it should go is at its least intrusive; and as i said, stairs will align better to this setup so you really should use this over anything else.
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Indeed I think 2fort is the minimum, at least I always got that feeling from playing it. Gameplay isn't bad, but I do have frequent problems like you mentioned, getting pinned to the ceiling and certain narrow hallways.
I also noticed, now that you mention rocket jumpers, that in higher ceilings (minimum 256 I guess) I can still rocket jump forward by shooting a bit behind me and get to destination faster. This is not possible at all in the lower floor of 2fort. I guess it's something to consider and to take into account.
But you brought up an interesting point.
I think I noticed that in ctf scales are indeed a bit smaller in certain parts. And in cp maps they are mostly open spaces, but indoor spaces are multistory buildings with such a layout that favors double scout jumping and rocket jumping quite often.
The map I'm making is quite experimental, with an unusual goal, but the game mode is koth, in which the cp is, if I'm not mistaken, often set in a large and high (and very exposed) open space.
I think I can see a bit of patterns like those throughout different game modes (excluding the obvious layout differences).
Well, I'll see what I can do. Maybe you're right and I'm worrying too much.
I also noticed, now that you mention rocket jumpers, that in higher ceilings (minimum 256 I guess) I can still rocket jump forward by shooting a bit behind me and get to destination faster. This is not possible at all in the lower floor of 2fort. I guess it's something to consider and to take into account.
But you brought up an interesting point.
grazr said:
I think I noticed that in ctf scales are indeed a bit smaller in certain parts. And in cp maps they are mostly open spaces, but indoor spaces are multistory buildings with such a layout that favors double scout jumping and rocket jumping quite often.
The map I'm making is quite experimental, with an unusual goal, but the game mode is koth, in which the cp is, if I'm not mistaken, often set in a large and high (and very exposed) open space.
I think I can see a bit of patterns like those throughout different game modes (excluding the obvious layout differences).
Well, I'll see what I can do. Maybe you're right and I'm worrying too much.
CTF tends to be smaller because the teams are split into 2 roles. It's not one team attack one team defend with 12-16 players a team undertaking the same team role, the teams get split with half the team attacking and half defending. The smaller scales tend to work simply because combat happens on a much smaller scale; engagements are more like 4-on-4 to 8-vs-8 as opposed to 16 vs 16. Combat also happens at certain focal points around a map which are significantly detatched from each other: nomans-land, sewer, base courtyard and intel room, which also reduces (or dilutes if you will) the flow of players through certain chokes that otherwise seem so tiny.
Updated with some minor edits and replacement images. I've only used the originals from photobucket though, so the definition still kinda sucks on some of the images where the host site throttled their compression from over sharing on a free profile. But a least the horrific watermarks are gone.
I'm gonna be doing this to my others as well.
I'm gonna be doing this to my others as well.
Edward_shooter
L1: Registered
- Dec 20, 2020
- 28
- 4
The links to "potential articles of interest" seem to be broken...?