We played with Joequake as server. We did not play in one piece though (e1 on one evening and e2+fin on another) so we might have avoided that crash by this. 

I've checked what happens and it's ye olde signon buffer (size 8000) that overflows in Fitz/Joe/etc when running qte2m1 in coop (with more than one player) on Hard skill. It probably was already close to the limit and the extra players tip it over the edge.

Except for using an engine that can cope with this, I don't think there's anything to do except change the map. I made a quick fix and by just deleting the six last ambient_lavagurg ents, Fitz can play the map with four players (one more and it fails again).

You could try deleting other ents as well, but they must exist on Hard to make any difference obviously. The lavagurgs seemed to be of less importance here ... ;)

I even tried various forms of dedicated server solutions (e.g. running my engine as a dedicated using std protocol 15 with Fitz clients), but I couldn't get any of them to work. The signon buffer seems to overflow one way or another. 

After trying again, it actually seems like it's working using my engine as a dedicated server for Fitz (or other) clients. But the signon buffer size must be kept beneath 8192, otherwise the limited clients will abort anyway.

This means up to 12 players seems OK and I've run several limited clients while mowing my way through qte2m1 on Hard.

The ammo/health shortage was bad though, dying way too many times. But that's a different story ... 

...since we'll probably only be running with three players, killing lavagurgs should do the job :) This map and qte2m3 are right on the edge in terms of many limits, but then it was always about getting as close as possible without breaking things.

Thanks as always aguirRe, and with respect to ammo/health :P :P :P :P :P :P ;) 

Played through on hard, mostly by mistake. Was hard! Am going to go through on easy and try to find some more secrets now...

The main impression is: wow, what a lot of work has gone into this. Congratulations to all involved on getting it out the door.

Like many others, I found episode one a bit busy and cramped. Episode 2 was pretty amazing all through. Found the boss battles a bit annoying, but nothing new there.

There's life in this quake 1 thing yet! 

Played the first level. Overwhelming impression is some cool scenes and desires and some pretty poor gameplay situations that often make the cramped designs hinder the player. It got better towards the end though.

Then I finished and it dumped me back to the start map. 

you played qte1m1, found the exit in the tunnel below water and you didn't end up in qte1m2? That's the only way out of that map ...

Do you have any zipped savegame to upload so it can be reproduced? 

Are you playing the Travail preview instead of the full release? The demo map returns the player to the demo start map.

I hope you make it to at least qte1m4 in Episode 1. IMHO, it's my best map in Travail. Sorry for all the others, folks. 

...what size is the .zip file you extracted from? 

You shouldn't be sorry for your map contributions in Travail. I feel that they're very imaginative, with great textures and brushwork and a nice mix of oldskool atmosphere and newer styles.

And your dedication to push through, while fighting horrendous tool processing times, is nothing but remarkable.

Keep up the good work and let's see more maps! 

yeee, episode two is more good looking becouse of the textures... but episode 1 give us lots of exploracion and old school gameplay

:) hope to see more from you Scragbait... you maps are much much better then mines! 

why do i get the feeling that was a 'fish for compliments' type apology? ;)

for what it's worth, i thought the outdoor areas in those maps were excellent & quite inspiring. i'd actually be interested in seeing a collaborative map between you & distrans, since his maps felt more solid & neat, but yours had more creative & spectacular environments. i feel that combination could go somewhere! 

you maps are much much better then mines!
My Mines Are Better Than Your Explodes! 

Yeah I exited out of the tunnel.

The zip I've got is travail.zip, 39.4 meg.

The only save-game I've got is from much earlier in the map (pre-outdoor area I think).

Lemme check to see if I can load the second map individually...

Oh okay I see.

I am playing Travail Preview....though I did download Travail itself. Ummm that might explain things.

Victory For Shambler!!!

(Have now installed full Travail and second map loads by itself at least etc etc) 

that qte2m6 cannot be loaded in DM mode, due to missing precached models. Then again, I guess it wasn't really meant for serious DM anyway ...

It's interesting because if you force it to load in DM, there'll still be some monsters, along with respawning items for the player, very handy ... 

It's caused by the modelindex hack, the info_notnull entities are not spawnflagged to be removed in DM mode. None of the maps are meant for it, there no DM settings in any of them. 

Can this be hacked in?

Could be useful for in a boss fight, or even a respawning arena battle. 

See the Progs.dat Tricks thread.
Qte2m5 has a respawning Pentagram for instance. 

I'd forgotten it was there - I combed most of that thread during warp.

cheers. 

Played QTE1M2 and a bit of QTE1M3....

So, tell me Scraggy, on a scale of, say, 8 up to 10, how much were you inspired by Unreal and Half-Life mapping??

It's good stuff. The combat is good now too, tough and good. 

Travail E1 Influence Factor

Unreal: 5/10
Half-Life: 0/10
Tronyn: 7.5/10

I always liked Unreal - it was as immersive as Quake but in a spacious world. BTW, it even had a more open musical score then Quake's dark, almost claustrophobic selection.

I really liked Half-Life but it never entered my mind while producing E1.

If there was one stand out influence, it would be another Quake mapper rather then another game. I have always enjoyed Tronyn's sprawling, journey-like and id textured maps. Like Tronyn, I also used less repetitive geometry in QTe1m1 to QTe1m3 and QTe1m5. I tried to make a variety of structures to motivate the more curious player to continue without knowing what they might see next. This type of mapping dragged production of these maps over 4 years (crazy slow mapper Scraggy.)

My earlier maps - QTe1m1 to QTe1m3 are not well scaled and this has been made clear through feedback. With more experience, my other maps: QTe1m4 and 5 and QTFin2 and 3 are better. I still felt that the first three E1 maps had something to offer visually and that they did progress the Travail story through setpieces and were playable for players like myself, who progress in a more cautious and defensive manner and who like to sightsee along the way. Quake for me has always been about stopping amongst the corpses to take in the ambience. I knew that these maps wouldn't have universal appeal but I still like my ugly first-born children even with their zits and low foreheads. I agree that the first three E1 maps will frustrate a more aggressive and highly mobile player.

Thanks for all the feedback, func types. I do listen and for sure I learn. It is appreciated. This is the place to come to for the straight dope on map quality. 

I played through Travail twice and although the map I liked the most was the final map (*), the e2 maps were just too easy for me.

I really struggled and struggled on the e1 maps and was forced to explore the environment and manage ammo well.

Had the e1 maps not been so difficult, I probably would have just blown through all of the Travail without dying or having to get immersed in the environment.

(*) I really liked the mausoleum theme and the crack in the ceiling was just too great, plus I liked how the skybox changed to night at the end.) 

I vote the start of e1m1 as a temporary blip on the gameplay. Since then it has been interesting and fun and challenging in a good way. I'm a more cautious player so maybe it suits me, but I've found some pretty smart tactical challenges. The lower cave in the lava map being particularly interesting.

It's all good stuff. 

pack shines in the tactical/slow stuff. 

...speaking of influence. Did Painkiller enter the equation with respect to qtfin3, at least subconsciously?