Should I use displacements sparingly??

[Meebas]

I'm making a Versus Saxton Hale (VSH) map for a server. My inspiration was a sort of cloth-y, laundry-room type setting with patchwork and ventilation.
I've been using displacements for most of the terrain and I'm afraid that it's too good to be true; aren't displacements heavy on some computers?

So far my map (I'd say this is roughly 1/12-ish done) looks like this. With the proportions of displacements to blocks, would it be bad if I keep using them this much?

 

[henke37]

Displacements are rather cheap from what I've read. Just remember that they don't block visibility like normal brushes, so you don't get any freebies there.

 

[Meebas]

As in, they won't stop leaks? I think it'll be easy to put a shell around the edges to prevent this...

 

[DrLambda]

https://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/Displacement

Benefits

• They are rendered in batches, making it very cheap: per polygon face actually cheaper than standard brush geometry!
• They can be altered using the Paint Geometry tool to sculpt a wide variety of shapes, well beyond what can be created with brushes.
• An alpha channel for can be painted per-vertex to blend between two textures on the displacement. This can be used to create transitions between dirt and rock, for example.
• Can be automatically populated with detail props.

Check the first bullet point. As long as you put nodraw brushes beneath the displacements in a way that they cut VIS optimally and seal leaks, you should have no fear to basically use as many displacements as you like.

 

[Meebas]

Ah sweet, this is really reassuring. Thanks!

 

[zahndah]

Note: if you make a wall out of displacements, someone standing behind the wall will still render things behind the wall, so if you have walls inside the map you may want to make those out of brushes so as to not make the whole map loaded for people the whole time.

 

[Tumby]

Note: if you make a wall out of displacements, someone standing behind the wall will still render things behind the wall, so if you have walls inside the map you may want to make those out of brushes so as to not make the whole map loaded for people the whole time.

Or, as lambda has said, put a nodraw inside it.

 

[UKCS-Alias]

you should have no fear to basically use as many displacements as you like.

That is as long as you use low power numbers (2 or 3). Power 4 can quickly result into problems. In many cases power 2 already does enough.

 

[Meebas]

That is as long as you use low power numbers (2 or 3). Power 4 can quickly result into problems. In many cases power 2 already does enough.

I've only been using power 3

 

[LeSwordfish]

Or well, to be precise, what causes problems is when displacement vertices are too closely packed together. "Don't use power 4" is the easy way of saying this, but if you're using them a lot then beware - on small displacements, power 3 or 2 can also cause problems.

 

[UKCS-Alias]

Even then, there arent alot of cases where you realy need power 4. In most cases you can just achieve the same using 4 power 3 displacements. The most common mistake is simply that people just try to get the highest possible detail on a displacement which simply isnt needed. Once people know how and when to use a certain power they will also discover that for a power 4 displacement. As i can remember that on cp_gorge they did use some power 4's

 

[Requiesta]

Edit:

I once tested displacements with physics objects just out of morbid curiosity and using a 5000 unit bumpy plane I didn't have any trouble until I'd sewn 4 power 4 displacements together. So just don't do that...