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Level Design beginner questions concerning the brush tool, etc

Taxen

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Jan 18, 2010
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Hello, I am planning on making a map for killing floor, and the unreal editor seems fun and not too advanced (unless you want it to be :))

However, I have found som annoying things so far, first one is that I dont know how to edit the brushes (things like height and width), once its placed. is this possible? if not can I atleast delete just a segment somehow? or do i have to start from scratch/load an old save, every time i make an mistake? :eek:

I have tried to select it and press delete, but the texture is still showing in the preview, only the "box" dissapears. and if I simply drag the box larger the texture wont follow.

I have also tried using vertex editing but i cant get it to work, same problem as the previous questions.


Finally, I want a pipe in my map, large enough for players to walk in, the pipe turns out OK, but i also want a 'smooth' 90 degree turn on it, and to do that i have used many shorter cylinders with an increasing angle, and carved it out using the 'intersect'-tool.

But later I read in a tutorial that the intersect tool is bad and should be avoided, how can i accomplish the same result with other methods? and if a want another turn on my pipe somewhere, can i save the one i did as a "pre-set"-brush or something similar?

thank you for taking the time to read through my post!
 
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Here's how Vertex Editing works. If you want to cut off brushes you use Brush-Clipping.

Neither of these will update the "textures" as Brushes aren't rendered in real-time. If you add a new one you get a preview of what will actually happen when it's added (or subtracted) so you get to see the change right away, but if you delete or modify one you don't get a preview.
The actual integration of the brush into the geometry of the map only occurs once you Rebuild Geometry.
In short: Delete and modify, then click Build -> Rebuild Geometry to apply the changes.

For the pipe open the 2d-Shape-Editor and lay out something resembling a circle. You'll notice a green dot that can be moved. Move this to the center of the curve your pipe should follow. Then use the "Revolve" tool to make your pipe. If you need more help with this, ask again and I'll provide commented screenshots of the steps.
 
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Ok, my latest message havet been approved yet, do I have to do anything so the admins dont need to approve it? didnt find anything about it in the FAQ or search. anyway.. =)

What would be a good or bad use of the intersect tool? im guessing making just a sligthly curved pipe like this:


would classify as a bad use? atleast it looks quite messy, or is there an easy to use 3d-model program that you could make the more advanced brushes in and then import them?

and Murphy, the revolve tool worked great for the 90 degree turn.

Thanks!
 
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It will probebly be alot of pipes, and quite long ones. and from what I have read, if you see a small part if the staticMesh the whole mesh wil be rendered. not sure if its a big deal, but it might run slow? im planning on making a map that takes place in the sewers.

So carving everything out "by hand" with the revolve-tool, and maybe a staticMesh as the end-part that stick out in rooms, might work best.
 
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The intersect tool is a bit hard to describe but basically its for creating a shape within the solid mass that intersects subtraction brushes. One good use is making doorways between rooms, another is around a group of brushes that you want to turn into a static mesh.

As for your screenshot, I don't see how the intersect brush would help. What you are probably better off doing, is using brush clipping to cut off parts where the brushes overlap. When subtraction brushes overlap it creates BSP holes that look like a "portal to nothingness" when you are playing the level. You should look up a tutorial because the keyboard/mouse controls in brush clipping aren't obvious.

But basically think of brush clipping as a line you draw across the pipe, where your brushes overlap. Then select one of the brushes, and 'clip off' the part of the brush on the other side of this line. Then you flip the clipping 'normal' (the key in this case is to not actually move your clipping markers), select the other brush that is involved in the overlap, and clip that as well.
 
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It will probebly be alot of pipes, and quite long ones. and from what I have read, if you see a small part if the staticMesh the whole mesh wil be rendered. not sure if its a big deal, but it might run slow?
Give the engine a little credit. I'm sure it can handle some pipes. At any rate a network of pipes is probably one of the easiest environments to optimize. So unless you have something really extreme planned I think you'll be fine.

Intersect: If anything you would have to use Deintersect in the situation on your screenshot. What Intersect and Deintersect do is to fold your Builder Brush around a geometric structure. E.g. you could have a small model of a fairly complex table that consists of multiple brushes. You could then place the Builder Brush around it and click Intersect and it would take the shape of the structure and you can add it with the newly shaped Builder Brush then. The advantage being that it is now one Brush. This serves little purpose (a couple of simple brushes are less prone to produce errors than few complex brushes) except to have structures that involve subtracts (e.g. a 3d version of the Gears of War logo with a subtracted cylinder in the center) turned into one Add brush, which can then be converted to a StaticMesh (subtracts cannot be converted to StaticMeshes otherwise as they count as Adds for the conversion. The Gears of Wars logo would then be full in the middle once converted).
Deintersect is about the same as Intersect but from the other direction.
Imagine a bust of Caesar with the Builder Brush Cube around its upper part of the head. Clicking Intersect would produce a Builder Brush shape that would resemble the part of Ray Liotta's head that got cut off in Hannibal. Clicking Deintersect would produce a cube with a dent in the bottom.

What you should do is make your pipes in a 3d program but not the whole map (or, as you correctly stated it would have to rendered fully at any given moment)! Just pipe-segments. Then you subtract your map's layout with cubes instead of pipes and piece together your pipe-segments inside those cubes.
This is also how most pipes are handled in official UT2003/4 maps. E.g. CTF-Geothermal or DM-Corrugation
 
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I have tried to make a simple modell and save it as a brush in 3d-studio max, but when I import it I get an error, something like "Have you forgotten to import geometry AND textures", or something like that, I will check it out once I get home. this happens if I save it as .ase, I also tried the .dx-'something' format but then the loading bar just seems to freeze at 0%

Also when I do something in the 2d-editor, I dont seem to be able to change its size, I have used the scale options to change the brush but when i crave it out its still the regular size.

And if I try to scale the room once its been placed only the yellow outlines change, like my previous problems, only this time rebuilding the level wont update the texture.
 
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You can't scale brushes using Draw Scale. Select the ones you want to scale and right-click one of them and chose Transform Permanently Scale and scale them there.
Or, if you just want to scale them by a factor and you don't need to stretch or squish them you can go to Tools -> Scale Map (despite its name this will only scale the actors / brushes you have selected!) and use that instead.

You still need to rebuild for the 3d preview to update, obviously.
 
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Thanks for the quick reply!
and I just thougth of onother question, is there a way to scale the brushes to fixed units. like "set Z axis to 512 units" or something similar? or a place i can see the current length/heigth of the selected brush?

I keep foretting what I used and it takes more time for me to calculate stuff like, how much should i scale this axis to make 512 become 720.
 
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If both ends of the side are on the grid and the side is perfectly parallel to the grid you can measure its length by holding shift and the middle mouse button and dragging a line over it in a 2d viewport. The length of the line is displayed in a small box in its middle. This gives you X.
Then decide how long you want it. That's Y. Then just divide Y/X. That's the factor you need to scale it by.

You can let UnrealEd figure out simple calculations like that. Instead of typing "1,40625" as the factor for scaling you can type "720/512" and UnrealEd will calculate that its 1,40625 and use that then. Be aware though, that UnrealEd tends to make rounding errors from time to time and scaling brushes can lead to non-planar planes and thereby to BSP-errors. I'm not saying don't use it, but use it with caution and maybe restrict yourself to simple factors, like 0.5, 1.5, 2, etc to minimize the risk.
 
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Thanks again Murphy, that worked like a charm!
now I got a minor issue with the lightining on the ceiling of my bezier-shaped corridor.


Is there a way to not get those black shadows that seperate the segments? im guessing it has something to to with the light I added. but I cant fint an answer to it on my tutorial sites.
 
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In UnrealEngine 1 one could check a flag for the surface that said "bright corners" and it minimized this effect. In UnrealEngine 2 this option is unfortunately gone. To get something round to look smooth you'll have to make a model with a smoothing group in a 3d program and import it as a StaticMesh into UnrealEd and use that then.

Maybe you can steal the tunnel ceiling from KF-WestLondon (copy+paste). You can follow the advice in this thread to change the texture of the model to your brick texture.
 
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