One of the mission pack progs has spawning monsters, meaning you don't place the monster in the editor, the trigger actually generates a monster during play. I think it's the hipnotic progs.dat but I'm not sure. There's also an example map... somewhere... keep googling. 

I meant with the new AI and stuff. 

I figured I'd have a go at this, seeing as some of the versions I've seen have issues with telefragging/stuck monsters and monsters freezing for a second after teleporting. Mod and source at:
http://www.btinternet.com/~chapterhonour/teleport.zip
There's a readme in there, but basically set the monster's style to 1 and target it to teleport it in. 

I meant with the new AI and stuff.

well, see, that would count as screwing up the gameplay to me. it'll be a lot harder to play, so you could experience ammo shortages, lack of health, etc... stuff you would never know if you had played it the way it was meant to be played. ;) 

From what Bal told me, none of the mappers knew the game was going to be so difficult; otherwise they would have put in more ammo and such. 

I am using BspEditor and do not want to change (having recently tried several others) but I do have a bit of a problem with its Merge Brushes feature. I have a 12,000 brush map that I want to reduce in size and BspEditor takes an age e.g. the base for this particular map is 4000 brushes and the merge function takes (took) 8 hours. In addition, if the PC is 'touched' during merging the program crashes.

So, can anyone recommend a brush merge facility? And no, I do not want to do it by hand!! 

kidding, of course ;D

I think you may be stuck with toughing out 8 hour merges... GtkRadiant is the only other editor that has a CSG merge command, and that only works for selected brushes to join into 1 brush... you'd basically have to go thru your whole map merging everything you want together. This may be a faster/easier process in the end, so keep it in mind.


btw, 12,000 brushes? 'whoa'. 

merge it in bsp, then export to .map, then open that .map in radiant, continue your map there, and merge as you go. 

Hipnotic/Ritual's Scourge of Armagon mission pack has an entity called a func_spawn, which allows you to "teleport in" anything - ammo, keys, monsters, func_kitchen_sink, anything. With the right flags or whatever, you can use it more than once.

Zerst�rer uses spawnflag 64 on monsters to delay their spawning. No teleport effect, and I think there is a slight delay after spawning, since it basically holds off on starting the monster until use. 

Why do you want to merge brushes, am I missing something here? The 12k brushes are no problems for the compilers, except for sheer processing time, that is. 

thats quite a lot, isnt it? =) 

 

I was wondering the same. I use to get similar sizes when I experimented with mesh to brush programs but as you can see that is a lot of trouble to deal with if that is the source of the magnitude here. If it just so happens that 12000 brushes is the number of brushes Mike arrived at more power to him. Even my largest maps have been less than 4000 when built entirely in editor. 

I want to merge to a) cut down compile times and b) to speed up the 3d window view; because I have not finished the map yet.

I really do not want to have to learn a new editor. I favour compiling two or three times per maping session, especially as this part of the map is a definite "make it up as you go along" area.

Ho hum, I figure that if I start merging before I go to bed on a workday, it should be finished by the time I come home from work the following noght. That gives the merge program some 16 hours. 

do you only have to merge once, or every time you want to compile? And do the compile times really drop enough to make up for the time spent merging? 

Only once. But I am impatient!

Problem solved - I have dug my old PC out of the cupboard and I am getting on with the next section of the map whilst the one-time merge of the terrain section is run on the old machine. Now it doesn't matter if it takes two days.

Also, having played around with aguiRe's lighting program, I now know that I can build the whole thing from smaller sections and will not have a lighting consistency problem when I join the maps at a later stage.

Finally, and this would also solve a lot of the issues for me, I seem to remember playing a set of maps that were linked through one map. Rather like a start map that you returned to and the effects of your previous visits were still evident e.g. the bodies remained, doors were still open, ammo that you took on a previous visit were not replaced.

Have I got the right game? 

However, numerous solutions to 'hub' maps have been bandied about over on http://forums.inside3d.com
I think the consensus is that you can do it for a very few objects with minor QC patching, or for more objects only with engine modding. 

...back to the 12,000 brush map then. 

In my next version of Light, I've added something I call local minlight which may help joining together map parts that have different ambient requirements.

Local minlight is created by new delay 4 lights that are similar to delay 3 lights, but non-additive and they can go below the global minlight. These lights "cast minlight" which I hope can be quite useful.

This makes it rather flexible in creating different ambient levels in different areas. 

... how about how kind of 'range' keyvalue on it? 

'Finally, and this would also solve a lot of the issues for me, I seem to remember playing a set of maps that were linked through one map.'

Was it The Demon King perhaps? 

That's an excellent idea. 

#1288 posted by HeadThump [65.140.55.94] on 2004/03/01 16:29:34
I had no idea UD has single player capabilaties. I have some older levels on my harddrive I could fix up for the mod...

Great, currently the download times are insane on fileplanet. Post your email here and i'll get in contact with you. Use spam bot protection.
namedon'tspammeyousickbastards@location.com

Thanks, as 

Actually, I shouldn't have any problems downloading it, but if you want to reach me directly alanr643@msn.com should suffice.

I worked on a retexturing project this weekend, so it will be later in the week that I can rework those maps for you -- let's shoot for Thursday (and if my honey Leah Remini's butt gets any bigger, maybe even Wednesday). 

Thanks aguirRe.

HeadThump, no I've never played Demon King. I was sure it was a Quake level 'cause I remember thinking how convenient it was: I build my maps big which leads to problems but if you could transport between smaller maps without re-setting everything...

Managed to reduce the 12,000 brushes to 856, so BspEditor Merge Brushes really does work even if slowly. And it wasn't crashing, if the mouse or keyboard was used, the display simply stopped showing the number of brushes being checked. I noticed this because the hard drive light continued to flick. So, leave it alone and show some patience.

Finally, I remember a map or mod with particularly accurate Ogres - either it was the grenades being lobbed a long way or they were using rocket launchers/bazookers. Can anyone point me in the right direction please?

Regards, Mike