high poly kungfu countered by sapien freeze attack

[sleepy1212]

radiosity error: smooth triangle group too large for page....

so i took off all the smoothing groups and made a lightmap in tool but what i'd like to know is, besides optimizing (in the process of doing that), how do i avoid this error?

i've tried reorganizing SGs, tried one, tried several...i'm considering duplicating the texture...haven't done it yet.

[FRain]

How big is your map?

[Con]

I'm curious about why you're getting this problem and a map like hugeass didn't. I don't know tool's reasoning behind it so I can't say for sure, but it might have something to do with the number polys in the smoothing group and not necessary the size. Can we see a wireframe of this smoothing area?

[sleepy1212]

shit...i just closed up everything, maybe i can get a wireframe tomorrow..

i do have an overhead though...no textures just diffuse as placeholders

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v389/sleepy1212/Dessicated_floorplan.jpg
^100% msmooth, the actual is much less than that about 1/3 on the lowest portions and large rocks

it's kind of like a grandcanyon/desert thing...

right now the errors just on the middle texture of the cliff sides but i'm pretty sure it simply exceptioned on that one first with more to follow.

total size of the map 41,700 tris... and maybe BG size but wider, i timed it, takes 36 secs for MC to walk from one corner to the opposite so maybe just smaller than BG. i have two textures that probably account for 50% of the tris (due to smoothing) one of them listed by the error text.

[Kalub]

sweet jesus......



You need to start over >_<

[Inferno]

There is everything wrong with that map.

Start over. Think up a better layout. Don't mesh smooth.

[Con]

Like Kalub and Inferno have said, start over. Applying a bunch of mesh smoothing is NOT the proper way to make a map. 41 000 tris is ridiculous. A map like that should be at most 5k, depending on the amount of detail you want. Judging from your skill level, you should keep it simple and try some modeling tutorials. I also recommend that you create a new layout. It doesn't look original, fun, balanced, or purposeful.

Sorry, but we can't let something like this go. Don't get into the bad modeling habits.

[neuro]

you're getting errors because you haven't got a damn clue of what you're doing.

if your mesh is all under a single smoothing group, it wont bake proper lightmaps,
hell, i once had a straight strip on one smoothing group in a lift shaft which prevented it from baking lightmaps.

learn to model, then learn to build a map, and your problem's fixed

[t3h m00kz]

You can probably find some terrain modeling video tuts over at Halomaps. Sitting through and watching the process helps alot.

[sleepy1212]

if you think this is bad then you'll really love the very first run of this map: dessication (http://hce.halomaps.org/index.cfm?fid=4837)

in that version i tried to get the affect of large volumes of sand piled up around the edges but it really didn't work at all and ended up looking retarded. i also didn't like the boxy layout. (ca 6000 tri)

that's when i remodeled the whole thing over again and used a copy to mess around with mesh smoothing, which looks ok ingame. just trying to see what i could do with it but it looks like consensus is I shouldn't use it at all.

good thing i saved the low poly versions...or maybe not if the layout gets so much hate. no one does desert maps really so i'd like to keep working on this..much crit needed though

Here (http://www.4shared.com/file/158356105/a226c8ea/dessicated.html%3Cbr%20/%3E) is the first ingame test run i did of it in it's current state. (barely unwrapped, awful portal placement, yup, i know)

guess the first thing i need to address is the "original, [un]fun, [un]balanced, and [un]purposeful" layout..so [U]be specific if you can help

[Inferno]

Your layout is bad from what I can see. You need distinct main paths leading directly to your goal (usually the other base) while having smaller paths winding around it and containing valuable items (flamer, shotgun, powerups) while having heavy weapons dead center of the map in a dangerous area ( rockets on BG ).

There are a bunch of useless dead ends scattered around your map that would end up being wasted space and polygons. The few paths in your map that you do that are HORRIBLY susceptible to sniper and pistol fire. You really need to add more cover.

[Vicky]

If this is kinda his second map i'd say keep it up, he'll get the hang of gameplay later on.. make some nice maps first :P

[sleepy1212]

yes...snipers are a problem here. most of the crit i got on the first version was about cover. i don't really know what i could add but i think i could bend the whole left side around the middle so that it cuts off long range fire and forcing main traffic through a W-curve rather than a wide open space (pic 2). this would also help tighten up the map and make it smaller

traffic layout atm:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v389/sleepy1212/Dessicated_floorplan_marked.jpg

proposed layout
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v389/sleepy1212/DEZFLPL_2.jpg



If this is kinda his second map i'd say keep it up, he'll get the hang of gameplay later on.. make some nice maps first :P


beta :D (http://www.4shared.com/file/138094516/a3f5e6e/ganymede_beta.html)

[Con]

Tightening up the map is the wrong idea. You're just constraining the little gameplay it has and making it easier for snipers to make kills. Those teleporter exits are out in the middle of nowhere and you're better off walking from the base--they do little to balance the vehicle path with the foot path, especially when you teleport to an area with only narrow one way out. I think we've had enough of the canyon maps in Halo. Think of something that's never been tried before. It's fairly easy to draw some squiggly lines for cliffs and call it a map, but what I sometimes do for inspiration is find a neat looking object in my house and imagine how its surfaces could be turned into a map. You can always use Google to find interesting terrain as well. In addition, your spawn area looks too big compared to your bases. It's best to spawn players at their base where the weapons, flag, and teleporter are.

[NerveBooger]

I think you should complete this map, and add to it suggestions made here. Don't scrap it - just re-shape or redesign when possible but keep to your idea - and within your skill level - plus one.

Keep it up. looks like a significant improvement over the other one you posted.

[LlamaMaster]

Like others have said, never, ever use meshsmooth unless you know exactly what you are doing. If you want something smoother, you can either chamfer an edge, or cut a new one. Only add polys when you need to in a localized area. Also, it's a good idea to save "stages" of the map (steps in development) every one in a while (and before anything drastic). That way if you screw up something you can go back. Seems obvious, but it saves you alot of pain...

[sleepy1212]

Tightening up the map is the wrong idea. You're just constraining the little gameplay it has and making it easier for snipers to make kills. Those teleporter exits are out in the middle of nowhere and you're better off walking from the base--they do little to balance the vehicle path with the foot path, especially when you teleport to an area with only narrow one way out. I think we've had enough of the canyon maps in Halo. Think of something that's never been tried before. It's fairly easy to draw some squiggly lines for cliffs and call it a map, but what I sometimes do for inspiration is find a neat looking object in my house and imagine how its surfaces could be turned into a map. You can always use Google to find interesting terrain as well. In addition, your spawn area looks too big compared to your bases. It's best to spawn players at their base where the weapons, flag, and teleporter are.

i turned a pocket-hole jig (cabinetry tool) into a base for one of my first models lol.

i'd like to do more ledge and crevice for combat really...if you've taken a look at pics of the grand canyon or watched and old western lately most of the fighting...the most interesting part... is happening on the face of the cliff. i had intended to do that but made the map too large for one, then seriously couldn't afford to put the extra polies into it. i'd think id rather take it in that direction than a canyon-floor based map.

the spawns would have been about 25% outside the base area, 75% inside...i think it helps end spawn kills and keeps things challenging for players approaching the base area....plus a head start for the defending team.


I think you should complete this map, and add to it suggestions made here. Don't scrap it - just re-shape or redesign when possible but keep to your idea - and within your skill level - plus one.

Keep it up. looks like a significant improvement over the other one you posted.

i will and thanks


Like others have said, never, ever use meshsmooth unless you know exactly what you are doing. If you want something smoother, you can either chamfer an edge, or cut a new one. Only add polys when you need to in a localized area. Also, it's a good idea to save "stages" of the map (steps in development) every one in a while (and before anything drastic). That way if you screw up something you can go back. Seems obvious, but it saves you alot of pain...

would it be better to chamfer loops for topography? oh yes, i save a lot..i have 5 copies of this map in various stages...its a habit, i'm a draftsman.

[sleepy1212]

Update:

since all i really wanted to do was make a really good desert map i'm scrapping the first build and make something entirely different.

the plan here is to make a very tight canyon..by canyon i mean more of a giant trench rather than a traditional canyon (and only 3-4 stories high). gameplay will be on various tiers, the first being the "floor" where faster, less purposeful or simple run-and-gun traffic will occur. the upper levels will be a combination of ledges, paths, and tunnels along the sides while land bridges will connect the sides at various points. in these areas traffic will be slower but there will be lots of cover. they will also lead to better weapons, power-ups, and will contain most of the "advantage" postions.

the overall feel will somewhat similar to prisoner although this will be longer between the bases. i haven't decided whether to have vehicles or not, most likely no unless i open the top up like a typical sloped canyon with a plateau on top.

the following will be one of the base areas and represents about 1/5 of the entire map.i haven't done anything to the sides yet. i think i can get the whole map in under 8,000 tris, maybe less.

enlarged wireframe (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v389/sleepy1212/canyonrwkWF.jpg)
enlarged render (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v389/sleepy1212/canyonrwkR.jpg)

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v389/sleepy1212/canyonerwk.jpg

i've also created a set of custom scenery for this map including a small cactus, agave, short and tall desert grass, a shrub, and a spindly desert tree. i'd like to make a carcass or some kind of skeletal remains to go along with this...i've been looking for a model of the oddball skull to use. any other ideas for this are welcome, i'll post some pics when i'm more satisfied with the results.

[LlamaMaster]

You still have a long way to go, but that is certainly better than that other disaster of a model. Try to even out your poly distribution; you have parts of the model that are relativly devoid of detail compared to the rest (mainly the pillar of rock on the right). Just try to use common sense, and make sure it's either rocky or smooth where it would be in real life. Avoid those god-awful hard edges that plague halo.

[Sel]

That isn't all that far off actually.

I released the model file for revelations here : http://www.moddb.com/mods/revelations

You might want to use that as a reference, if only to see how I did my terrain.

[Ki11a_FTW]

I released the model file for revelations here : http://www.moddb.com/mods/revelations

You might want to use that as a reference, if only to see how I did my terrain.

selentic please, we want this user to improve his work.

[Sel]

selentic please, we want this user to improve his work.

:smith:

[t3h m00kz]

selentic please, we want this user to improve his work.

oooooohhhh burrrn

[LlamaMaster]

selentic please, we want this user to improve his work.
Bahahahhahahahhahahahhahaa

Here's a terrian model that isn't terrible:

http://filesmelt.com/downloader/hurr19.max

That's about as high poly as Halo will let you go without killing over.

Edit: Without good portals I mean.

[sleepy1212]

You still have a long way to go, but that is certainly better than that other disaster of a model. Try to even out your poly distribution; you have parts of the model that are relativly devoid of detail compared to the rest (mainly the pillar of rock on the right).Just try to use common sense, and make sure it's either rocky or smooth where it would be in real life.

duly noted, i've collected several reference pics to help out as well...these two are what the sides might look like:

pic1 (http://nevadamagazine.com/images/articles/boxcanyon%C2%A9RandaBishop_thumb.jpg)
pic2 (http://sarahscapes.files.wordpress.com/2008/03/show_canyon-x-188.jpg)

many of the visual curves (e.g., erosion - pic2) will span multiple sections so the more of the model i complete the more i will be able to go back to previous sections and bring out those lines


Avoid those god-awful hard edges that plague halo.

that's one thing i hate about the terrain in many maps. especially the original PC set. nature just isn't like that.


thanks for the models, i'm sure they will help...even if one is of a map my shitcomp makes unplayable :raise:

[sleepy1212]

moar updateder! :v:

2/5 done (approx)
view 1 (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v389/sleepy1212/canrwk02.jpg)
view 2 (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v389/sleepy1212/canrwk03.jpg)
wireframe 2 (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v389/sleepy1212/canrwk_wf.jpg)

looks like i'll miss my 8000 tri mark but not too much i hope. there's some optimizing to do but it will just make room for details i haven't done...and a structure idea i've been mulling over.

thanks for the models again..definitely helped me solve some future problems. i could ask lots of questions but i'm not going to hijack my own thread except for two:

@llama: where's the .map, i remember seeing that model a long time ago?

@Sel: wtf @ the portals? was that all for render/fps or did you need different clusters? i find this really interesting because i'd never have thought to portal that way unless it was for something like fog, sound, etc..

[Inferno]

Select all your cliffs and hide unselected. Then use the deformation brush a wide radius with a small power.

Easy way to variate cliffs quickly.

[LlamaMaster]

That's much better than what you had before. Just follow what the pretty lady above me said and add some variation.


@llama: where's the .map, i remember seeing that model a long time ago?


It's in the ungodly process of texturing. After I make the ground bitmap/lightmaps I'll release a beta.

[sleepy1212]

alpha (http://www.4shared.com/file/166729310/67b12ba4/HK_alpha.html%3Cbr%20/%3E)

things to ignore:

placeholder textures, box UV's, vehicles...i put them in to see if they could possibly add any gameplay value...they don't. it was fun trying to get the hog around in there though :p uhh lets see what else...no rope bridges yet, no water...stuff like that.

all im looking for is fatal errors...also...any ideas on how i can make the cliff texture not blend in with itself all over the place? a lot of the landscape just blurs together.

[LlamaMaster]

Wow, you improved really fast. Your terrain looks very good considering how little experience you have. I noticed you chamfered your edges alot. This is okay, but you can't just leave the new edges wherever max puts them or else you have you will have ugly poly distribution (aka, the curves will still look blocky, and just have slightly smoother edges).

The textures are blending together because of a lack of proper lighting/UV's/shaders. Rip yourself some good shaders/textures from the campaign and use those (unless you want to make your own, but it's a pain in the ass).

The UV's are a different story. When you ramp up your curves/poly count, proper UV's become an increasing nightmare. You ***could*** just use a box UV map, but you will have seams everywhere. The alternative is dividing up your mesh and unwrapping parts of the geometry individually, but this takes an ungodly amount of time, and I don't think you should really bother for your first map. Just make sure that if you do choose the easy route that you don't tile the texture to hell like you did in this alpha.

Lightmaps are the easiest part. Once you have shadows everywhere things won't blend together, and your geometry detail should stand out more.

[sleepy1212]

Wow, you improved really fast. Your terrain looks very good considering how little experience you have. I noticed you chamfered your edges alot. This is okay, but you can't just leave the new edges wherever max puts them or else you have you will have ugly poly distribution (aka, the curves will still look blocky, and just have slightly smoother edges).

i've been doing this for almost a year now i just haven't made anything i really feel is good to release...2 other WIPs i'll finish when i learn enough to achieve what i want to with them. i noticed max chamfers like shit sometimes...its a good point though


The textures are blending together because of a lack of proper lighting/UV's/shaders. Rip yourself some good shaders/textures from the campaign and use those (unless you want to make your own, but it's a pain in the ass).

The UV's are a different story. When you ramp up your curves/poly count, proper UV's become an increasing nightmare. You ***could*** just use a box UV map, but you will have seams everywhere. The alternative is dividing up your mesh and unwrapping parts of the geometry individually, but this takes an ungodly amount of time, and I don't think you should really bother for your first map. Just make sure that if you do choose the easy route that you don't tile the texture to hell like you did in this alpha.

i like making my own textures, sometimes i use campaign details and bumps i just didn't bother making any for placeholders. though i was concerned about the cliff texture because in the past when i've made them with a direction "feel" e.g., with lines like my first build of this, the UVing looked awful when i made turns into tunnels.

i think i may just make a simple but large highres texture and then make a better detail map that way i can cut down on the tiling and still have high lod. this will help because a box uv will a go long way like this..but yeah, i've spent days unwrapping terrain and i still end up with ugly seams.

i'm going to unwrap the "floor" tonight and paint it sometime this week, this one is a must, no boxes here.


Lightmaps are the easiest part. Once you have shadows everywhere things won't blend together, and your geometry detail should stand out more.

that's good to know. there are hardly any very tight cliffs to follow that have good UVs or that aren't just straight up and down walls to compare to.

thanks for keeping up with this as well :D


UPDATE:

unwrapped the floor and went ahead and painted it

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v389/sleepy1212/crwkflrbmp.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v389/sleepy1212/crwkflruvw.jpg

the unwrap isn't the best but about as good as i get atm.

[sleepy1212]

i think i may have unleashed a holy unwrapping nightmare on myself with this one. after spending several days trying different approaches i'm nowhere nearer to having this uv'ed than i was when i started. having so many twists and turns and cliffs sharing the same texture is not good although i'm very pleased with the texture itself so far.

i even cheated and tried unwrella2 out but with limited success...it made the cliff walls look great and gave me something i could work with and stitch together nicely but it quickly turned to shit in the lower, more convoluted areas of the terrain. it doesn't help that i'm missing a step using the seam helper; i can't find the tool to place the pelt seams manually to convert them to map seams.

i think i'm going to have to break the whole thing down, flatten..and stitch it together by hand. the good news, it's only the cliff texture i'm fighting with...all the other textures i'm able to do with ease.

[Kalub]

You might be better off just box mapping the cliffs with a tileable texture. Then using the shader add detail maps and shit. Keep with the ground being unwrapped though, just try that method for the cliffs.

[sleepy1212]

You might be better off just box mapping the cliffs with a tileable texture. Then using the shader add detail maps and shit. Keep with the ground being unwrapped though, just try that method for the cliffs.

i made the texture tileable already, just in case. the problem with box mapping is the horrible streching i get and bad seam placement. i started breaking things down into smaller chunks and box mapping those, the large boulder like parts i mean. this still gives bad scaling and some bad seams i'll have to hide.

i'm mostly just frustrated lol...it will just take a long time.

[Con]

The way I do cliffs is to UV one segment at a time using view-aligned planar, collapse the stack, then unwrap that section plus the previous section you UV'd right beside it. In the UV window, move the new section to the edge of the old one and stitch them together using the tools. You can fold the UVs back on themselves, move sections by whole texture lengths, or slightly stretch cliff segments to get things lining up and ready to stitch. Using this method, you can get seamless cliffs except for difficult areas around tunnels and caves. This is a more time consuming way of doing it, but you won't get the same results with some box mapping.

[sleepy1212]

sounds promising, especially for the vertical sections; although unwrella did i good job there i don't want to rely on a program too much. it's the tunnels, caves, land bridges, etc... that are causing the aneurysms. lots of "sudden changes of direction". i'm getting some good tips so hopefully i can make some progress on this over the next couple of days.

[Matooba]

Jeez, When I seen " high poly kungfu countered by sapien freeze attack" I expected to see this:
http://t1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:g6klma2kPFg2zM:http://www.usageorge.com/Wallpapers/Computer/wallpaper/Broken-Screen.jpg

Nice Looking Map

P.S. Why is Bold stuck on?

[sleepy1212]

hey guess what....i'm still working on this fucking thing!!!! bah, mostly still trying to get the UV's looking good but since i was waiting on computer parts i decided to take a break from that and get some scenery work in.

if they turn out well i will release them as a desert scenery pack but i could use some crit.

and some help.....

1st, all the render only parts are lighted all wrong. only the tree trunk has normal collision and it renders fine. i need to know how to fix the others.

2nd, how to you UV rocks without seams?

here's some vid and the map this was shot in if anyone would like to take a closer look:

WMCL0smMiLM

Desert Scenery Display .map (http://www.4shared.com/file/206306572/9db8a5de/hk_display.html)

scenery featured:

agave
cactus
highgrass
lowgrass
sagebrush
desert cedar
large rock
med rock
small rock


i also need to know how to get some light down into the bsp of this map. it's not dark but very dull and it needs light without using actual lamps or skylight.

[Higuy]

i also need to know how to get some light down into the bsp of this map. it's not dark but very dull and it needs light without using actual lamps or skylight.
modfiy the b40 sky to your liking at use that

[kid908]

way too high in contrast in every field.
1. bright, dark
2. dull, interesting
3. detailed, low detail

It looks alot better than your first one, but the UV are horrid. work on uv, and such. Maybe less smooth cliffs.

[sleepy1212]

way too high in contrast in every field.
1. bright, dark
2. dull, interesting
3. detailed, low detail

It looks alot better than your first one, but the UV are horrid. work on uv, and such. Maybe less smooth cliffs.

what, exactly, are you commenting on? certainly not that box i made to display the scenery? maybe one of the old versions of the bsp?


thanks higuy, i'll try that sky.