Compiling Shite

[CREMATOR666]

Ok, I've been wondering for a veeery long time now, my map, which is only 40% finished took nearly 8 hours (or more) to compile. Is this normal? :dozey:

 

[brisck1]

only if your vvis is set to full. You should really use fast

 

[CREMATOR666]

Oh, I get it now, thx (but is it usually THIS long? It's only finished partially)

 

[Ranga]

wow... ur map must be pretty big. i'm making my third one now, and it takes about 5 mins to compile each time i want to test it. but i'm only about 30% done. (placing the entities takes a long time )

 

[CREMATOR666]

Here's some OLD screenies for you all trying to get a glimpse of how huge it actually is. (the current version still doesn't finish the vrad yet so it looked overbrighted and crappy)

This is from the map I'm talking about (this screenshots were taken weeks ago ) :
http://img198.exs.cx/img198/382/dawninvasion00007iq.jpg
http://img197.exs.cx/img197/4760/dawninvasion00022lv.jpg
http://img175.exs.cx/img175/5561/dawninvasion00134vs.jpg
http://img161.exs.cx/img161/3024/dawninvasion00179gw.jpg
http://img166.exs.cx/img166/2155/dawninvasion00278cg.jpg
http://img163.exs.cx/img163/8617/dawninvasion00383mc.jpg
http://img200.exs.cx/img200/4029/dawninvasion00590pk.jpg

The map I'm currently working on :
http://img196.exs.cx/img196/9062/screenies010am.jpg

 

[Angry Lawyer]

I have the horrible feeling your map is set inside a large box, as it's outdoors.

No map should take 8 hours to compile. The larger Valve ones only took two. Look into using occluders, and that sort of stuff.

-Angry Lawyer

 

[StardogChampion]

Maybe they only took 2 because they spread the load over however many PCs. But 8 hours does seem a while...

 

[Angry Lawyer]

Load up one of the hl2 singleplayer maps, and compile it. Watch how quickly it goes.

-Angry Lawyer

 

[FireCrack]

Yeah, cram the moutians full of occouders. If you've ever mapped for the unreal engine 2.0 they're just like antiportals (i think)

 

[CREMATOR666]

I got the feeling that I uses too much displacements What is occluders? :O

 

[Pi Mu Rho]

Also, use func_details for geometry that isn't going to block visibility. That way, it won't be used in the visibility calculations and bring the total VIS time down.

 

[brisck1]

and dont forget to use the almighty NODRAW texture on surfaces not in the view of the player

 

[CREMATOR666]

Hail Nodraw, hail!

 

[Ti133700N]

Displacements are great, they don't take up too much ressources.

 

[CREMATOR666]

So...what is occluders? Is it like area portals? :O

 

[Pi Mu Rho]

Displacements are great, they don't take up too much ressources.

They also don't block visibility.


CREMATOR666: Occluders are used to prevent you from seeing entities that would otherwise be drawn.

 

[Ti133700N]

You can put occluders behind displacements so those occluders won't be seen but they will block vis.

 

[Pi Mu Rho]

No they won't. Occluders block entities from being seen, they don't block world geometry. Poorly-placed occluders can adversely affect your framerate. If you want to block visibility in a displacement (like a hill), then put a solid brush inside it.

 

[Ti133700N]

That's what I mean, a solid brush is an occluder? no?

 

[Pi Mu Rho]

in technical terms, yes. However, there's also occluder brushes (brushes with the occluder texture on them) which just block entity visibility. Confusing, isn't it?

 

[PvtRyan]

Occluders won't help in speeding up compiling, since they're dynamic and done on the fly in HL2, not precompiled like hint brushes.

Longest I've had to compile for a Source game is 4 min. But not a very complex map, when done with compiling only 3000 world faces.

 

[Ti133700N]

in technical terms, yes. However, there's also occluder brushes (brushes with the occluder texture on them) which just block entity visibility. Confusing, isn't it?

Ok thanks for the confirmation, for a second I thought I was doing things wrong by putting solid brushes to block visibility.

PvtRyan, the longest I had to compile was a Month, that map was pushing every single limits of the HL engine to the max. Fortunalty, with HL2 we can now use models instead of brushes for complex surfaces. It helps alot.

 

[CREMATOR666]

I once compiled a map in HL1, took me 14 hours. That's a real nightmare