Various questions from water to sound.

[Houi]

Right then, this will be my first post, so hello and please don't hurt mehmy:.

Now then, on to buisness. I am relatively new to mapping, but I know the basics so never fear as I *should* know what you mean. However, I don't know much of the more advanced things which is what I need your help with.

1. I intened to create a river through my map that can be used as a high speed method of advance for the attacking team. To move people down the river I was thinking of using a func_push? (or was it a trigger_push?) to give them a boost as I've seen in another thread. However I didn't see any indication in the replies that the acceleration given to you is a once off when you get pushed or if it is constant in its pushing, so to speak as this is something I'd like to know.

2. What is the simplest way to move blocks around? For example, I wish to set it so that when Blu captures a point, it raises a dam to block a river and subsequently raise the rivers water level further up stream. how should I go about doing this?

3. I also wish to make a loud noise, like a klaxon or alarm when the dam is raised. How can i make such a sound for the entire map, or in such a way that it 'projects' from a point and gets quieter the further away you are?

4. Is there any way to resize props, such as fences or tree's, so they fit better in the area I want them, or do I need to resize the area to fit the props?

5. How do people get the textures that look like beaten paths in the dirt on to the ground in their maps? Same with roads etc.

6. Finally, I've heard that if you try to move a water block, it turns it into cheap water. Is there any way to simulate the expensive water using something else? I'm under the impression that cheap water simply looks like crap under water, and if so, could i use fog or something similar to try and get the same sort of effect as being under water?

That should be all for now, i'll come and annoy you guys later if i have more problems.

 

[Houi]

One other thing, could someone point me in the direction of a good ligting tutorial? I've been having problems getting the lights to work correctly and some of my textures have an annoying tendency to disappear at times.

 

[medd]

I'm not very experienced myself, so I can't answer most of your questions. But I can help with a couple I think.

#4 By my understanding, you can't resize props.

#5 The brush that you want to look like a beaten path has to be a displacement, and the texture has to be anything with blend in it, i.e. nature/blendground_canyon
After you have turned it into a displacement, use the face edit tool on the displacement, go to the displacement tab, and use the "Paint Alpha" tool. Use that on the displacement and you'll see how it works pretty easily.

Hope this helps

 

[YM]

1. func/trigger_push (I can't remember either) has a speed seting and it provides a constant force that matches the speed setting.

2. func_door can be ok for platforms that only have two positions, func_movelinear also works for lift type things, for more complex paths you'll want to use a func_track train and a string of path_track entities

3. an ambient_generic entity has both the abilities you mention, to use a custom sound you can put it in /tf/sounds and then use pakrat to embed it into the .bsp file for distribution.

4. Props can't be resized without first decompiling them. Even once you've done that you have to pack them in using pakrat, increasing filesize. for almost all cases its not worth it. There is a prop_scalable hanging around source but it can't be used for anything practical so don't go chasing that one.

5. Overlays, the overlay tool (tool uner the bullseye on a block or shift+o) after selecting a texture use the overlay tool to place it on a brush

6. Not likely, cheap water is cheap, you can't mimic the effects of expensive water.

7. Use the link in my sig and the VDC to look up all the things I've suggested.

8. Welcome to the forums :thumbup1:

 

[A Boojum Snark]

6. Finally, I've heard that if you try to move a water block, it turns it into cheap water. Is there any way to simulate the expensive water using something else? I'm under the impression that cheap water simply looks like crap under water, and if so, could i use fog or something similar to try and get the same sort of effect as being under water?

Under-water you don't notice the effect as much, though it's still that. The difference between cheap and expensive is how the surface is rendered. Cheap uses pre-calculated blurry cubemaps for reflections. Expensive uses real-time reflection and refraction.

 

[Houi]

Thanks all. This should help me get everything working... one day at least .