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English Mobster
January 4th, 2009, 11:55 PM
OK, I compiled a map. I was having some issues with framerate loss here and there, so I added in some exactportals and tried to run it through tool. However, now it says that tool couldn't update the edges at all of my exactportals... Help! :confused2:

Sel
January 5th, 2009, 08:40 AM
Make them regular portals?

idk, I've never once bothered to use exactportals. Never seen the need.

FRain
January 5th, 2009, 08:44 AM
Make sure your shaders don't have the + in it. Just the material name in MAX. I've never used portals before but something like that with my light planes has happened before.

Inferno
January 5th, 2009, 02:46 PM
+Exact Portal is just for sealing buildings so that when you go indoors the weather\background sound\sound environment changes.

Make sure you have the + mark in front of the mat name or it will fuck up.

Rentafence
January 5th, 2009, 02:46 PM
Just to be sure, are your portals part of the bsp or a seperate object entirely? they need to be the latter. Also, make sure the exact portals edges line up perfectly with the edges of the bsp they're sealing.

p0lar_bear
January 5th, 2009, 05:47 PM
OK, I compiled a map. I was having some issues with framerate loss here and there, so I added in some exactportals and tried to run it through tool. However, now it says that tool couldn't update the edges at all of my exactportals... Help! :confused2:

Make sure your material is named "+exactportal" and double-check that it is applied to all exactportal faces.

English Mobster
January 5th, 2009, 06:59 PM
Make them regular portals?

idk, I've never once bothered to use exactportals. Never seen the need.
I tried regular portals once, it fucked up majorly. A post on GBX suggested that I use exactportals.


Make sure your shaders don't have the + in it. Just the material name in MAX. I've never used portals before but something like that with my light planes has happened before.
Can you elaborate?


Make sure your material is named "+exactportal" and double-check that it is applied to all exactportal faces.
Yeah, it is...


Just to be sure, are your portals part of the bsp or a seperate object entirely? they need to be the latter. Also, make sure the exact portals edges line up perfectly with the edges of the bsp they're sealing.
That's a check, too.

My exactportals are material ID 2 of a multi/sub-object, along with my glass, playerclip, water, and unused regular portals.

Rentafence
January 5th, 2009, 07:04 PM
In reference to what Flamingrain was trying to say, make sure your +exactportal material doesn't have any bitmap associated with it.

English Mobster
January 6th, 2009, 12:37 AM
Still no dice. I double-checked and the seams are all lined up perfectly, I simply detatched the section of the model, created and detatched new faces to fill the hole, then attached the model back to itself and welded the verticies, but I always get errors along the lining of the portals.

Inferno
January 6th, 2009, 01:34 AM
Are you trying to seal a room or are you trying to portal a outdoor section of the map?

Pictures would help us determine a solution.

English Mobster
January 6th, 2009, 02:44 AM
Its an indoor map which I am trying to seal:
http://img210.imageshack.us/img210/2820/portalwn3.png
The portal has a bit of a transparency modifier in Max for easier modeling.

MMFSdjw
January 6th, 2009, 11:23 AM
Lots of info about portals. (http://gbxforums.gearboxsoftware.com/showthread.php?t=17321)

Matooba
January 8th, 2009, 07:20 AM
Also check this thread for portal help:
http://gbxforums.gearboxsoftware.com/showthread.php?t=27734 (http://gbxforums.gearboxsoftware.com/showthread.php?t=27734&page=2)


Exactportals,
Make sure the normals for the faces point outwards, this will help define the volume between the faces. the normals can be viewed by clicking on the Show Normals check box under Selection. If the normals are not easily visible, the lengths of the visual representations of the normals can be increased using the Scale value. Once this is complete, assign the +exactportal material to the faces by selecting all the faces and setting the Material ID to that of the exactportals.
Portals,
Under Create click on Plane.
Enter the following values in the listed fields, Length Segs: 1 and Width Segs: 5
Create the plane such that the edges extreme edges extend past the extents of the level.
Take this plane and create 3 more planes for a total of 4 planes that run lengthwise "North" to "South".
Convert all the planes into an Editable Mesh (Edit Mesh) and Attach all the planes into 1 object called "terrain portals".
Planes and faces should be aligned to try and divide the level evenly. Vertices and the associated edges and faces should be aligned along major edge boundaries in the level.
Faces running "West" to "East" should be created using the existing vertices and edges for the planes. Only the middle 4 edges and associated vertices should be used. In addition, the edges should be extended past the level boundaries. Make sure that the normals are consistent for all the faces, this will determine how the portal volumes are created. In the example, the faces running "East" to "West" have their normals pointing North, while the faces running "North" to "South" have their normals facing "East".

Per HEK