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kristus
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Good one Essel. Been using that method myself a lot. But I rarely seen anyone else do it.
Old Post 09-03-08 22:58 #
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jute
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These are good tips. Thanks for posting them!
Old Post 09-03-08 23:07 #
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Enjay
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esselfortium said:
With that said, though, I would imagine that typically arches that are made to be used for cover would be a bit thicker than 8 units.

Fair point. :)
Old Post 09-03-08 23:08 #
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Mik57
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You know, I already use all of these, but hearing them from esselfortium gives me more confidence that they are good techniques.

It also cured my cancer, and now Im not short with my wife anymore.
Old Post 09-03-08 23:52 #
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Spleen
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I remember fighting 2 cyberdemons at once in a room around 1024x1024 in size (MAP17 HR2), and I failed to dodge a rocket due to being stuck on a recess as I strafed around the edge of the wall, and consequently died. I was playing online and the server had 2 lives fortunately, so I finished the other one off (killed the first one before I died), but it was still a little annoying. I thought I should be more careful next time but now that I think about it the tip for mappers is really useful.

The point is, depending on how it is positioned, even a recess in the wall can cause some players to mess up, and also that Esselfortium's tip about details is more important with cyberdemons around than with any other monster.

Here's a diagram:

code:

   |
   |
    -
     |
    -
   |
  X|


The X is me as I'm facing west and strafing north, and happen to go into that recess because I'm staying really close to the wall and sort of hugging it. Sort of my fault, I know, but still. :P



About panels, you just made me love DOOM a lot more when I realized tricks like that work only with low res textures. Yay!
Old Post 09-04-08 02:00 #
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Tango
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Next up: Successfully making floating 3d crates
Old Post 09-04-08 04:13 #
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AgentSpork
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This is all pretty much common sense, at least to me. :P I'm a huge stickler for good texturing. Better use of textures > adding more sector detail.
Old Post 09-04-08 04:30 #
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kaiser_wilhelm
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Tell us in more detail how to align windows with startan.
Old Post 09-04-08 06:52 #
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Khorus
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kaiser_wilhelm said:
Tell us in more detail how to align windows with startan.


The best way to learn is with experimentation.
Old Post 09-04-08 14:06 #
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Death-Destiny
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Hey, while we're on the topic of aesthetic preferences, here's something I see every here and there that I think takes away some of the immersion of a map.

Check this out. Pretty neat huh? After you look at this, look at the screenie below it:
http://img71.imageshack.us/img71/3276/screenshotdoom200809060ld3.png






And the same room:
http://img145.imageshack.us/img145/2091/screenshotdoom200809060om2.png

Now, didn't that just kill the effect? See how the sky and the ceiling are at the same height? IMO, that kind of takes away some of the immersion since it would be intuitive to the player that a ceiling would have at least some thickness even if it's very small, so this effect may remind the player that the sky is simply a flat rather than the backdrop of your map.

Just my input about something I think is a good idea. =)

Last edited by Death-Destiny on 09-06-08 at 07:37
Old Post 09-06-08 07:31 #
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esselfortium
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Indeed, that's definitely a good mistake to point out, though I more commonly see it in the form of doors that open up without enough (or any) wall betweeh tnem and the sky, or "impossible windows" where the interior of a building has a higher ceiling than the rooftop outside. (Though you can get away with this if the high-ceiling area is a good distance away from the building's exterior, so you could imagine maybe not being able to see that part of the roof sticking up from where you're standing outside. Or you could use a portal :P )

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Old Post 09-06-08 07:35 #
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Haloless0320
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You should do this more often.It's a great way for us newbies to learn the tricks of the trade.
Old Post 09-09-08 17:00 #
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MG_Man
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I have a reply about the supports thing, a way for you to not get stuck even though it's jutted out.
code:
|
|\
|_\
   |
   |
 __|
| /
|/
|
|


The diagonal lines are impassible/player blocking invisible lines, so that you kind of slide through them without impacting on a sharp corner.

Here's another way. The || is the solid wall and the | is an impassible line.

code:
||   |
||   |
||__ |
    ||
    ||
    ||
  __||
||   |
||   |
||   |

Here, there is 1 impassible line that meets up with the end of the jutting support, so the player never goes into the gap that would get him stuck. It may seem ugly, but in a fast paced deathmatch, it could work.
Old Post 12-31-08 06:30 #
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printz
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MG_Man said:
Here, there is 1 impassible line that meets up with the end of the jutting support, so the player never goes into the gap that would get him stuck. It may seem ugly, but in a fast paced deathmatch, it could work.
Yes but impassable two-sided-bit lines have a notable bug in Doom: they facilitate wallrunning. The DM player will become aware of it and start to exploit an isolated, patchy map feature.

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Old Post 12-31-08 12:38 #
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myk
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Ah, so that's why some people put so much junk on the walls, they hate wall running!
Old Post 12-31-08 16:11 #
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esselfortium
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Rofl. Personally I don't worry about wallrunning -- I consider not being able to move around much more of a problem than being able to sometimes move faster across one wall some of the time. It's also possible to wallrun on some 1-sided lines as well, anyway, so even a completely bare and undetailed map can have the same issue.

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Old Post 12-31-08 17:22 #
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Lich
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These are excellent tips, Essel. The realistic alignment tip you posted can be put to good use in a single player ZDoom map I've been working on, as it makes extensive use of the GSTONE texture set.

-j
Old Post 12-31-08 18:38 #
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Kyka
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MORE TIPS, LESS CHAT




Heh... I mean, could we have some more tips, please. Found this thread really useful, even just as a reminder, and then it just kinda stopped a while back. :(
Old Post 01-01-09 11:47 #
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40oz
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Here's a tip I added to Doom Wiki yesterday, which basically defines what it means to appropriately align textures.

Ordinarily, most textures consist of a number of repeating shapes to create a pattern. Bricks for example almost always consist of a pattern of similarly shaped rectangles. The objective of aligning a texture appropriately is attempting to position the texture on the wall so that as many of the intended shapes included in the texture are displayed without being cutoff by a vertex in your wall. In many cases the texture can be aligned to repeat the texture so that none of the intended shapes are being cut off. Sometimes this can be very difficult to do, and can often be fixed by using a different texture designed to fit that particular length and height of the wall you are applying a texture to. In some cases, textures with no particular cracks (or too many to draw attentiont to) or bevels displayed in the image can be used in just about all lengths and heights of a wall, but using it excessively can make a map look very dull.

EDIT: For more clarification, wall textures that have no recognizable bevels or patterns would be wall textures like the ones in this picture. These textures rarely, if ever need to be aligned, but using too many of them will make a map look boring and uninteresting.

Last edited by 40oz on 01-02-09 at 01:57
Old Post 01-02-09 01:37 #
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40oz
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sorry to double post, but I often play around with doom builder to see if I can get a decent map going. A problem I often run into is that I rarely can stick to a consistent theme. I will often just pick from the assortment of Doom 2 textures that best fit an area, with disregard to the overall color of the texture. The texture or flat will often fit correctly in place without being misaligned, but the map tends to finish up looking like a jumbled rainbow. Any tips on sticking to a consistent color theme?

I'm considering making a square room outside the map with a ton of vertices, and just applying a ton of textures to every line in that room that is generally of the same theme, then continue mapping restricting myself to those textures. I'll have to try and see how that goes.
Old Post 01-02-09 02:12 #
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Creaphis
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JohnnyRancid said:
Any tips on sticking to a consistent color theme?


Well it's hard to know what to say aside from "Stick to a consistent color theme." But, I suppose it might help if you consider the overall theme of the map more carefully before you start. Make a firm decision that this is a red lava-filled cave, or that this is a stained cement tech base with a little bit of fleshy decay, and then stick to it.

Also, there's a difference between thematic unity and color consistency, and you can usually have different areas with different color schemes in one map with one theme. I'd have to see your maps to decide if your contrast is really excessive.
Old Post 01-02-09 02:56 #
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Mike.Reiner
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Ah, I missed this thread.

Good stuff Essel. A good mapper doesn't let the detail get in the way of the gameplay.
Old Post 01-03-09 01:03 #
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esselfortium
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Thanks everybody!

Mike.Reiner said:
A good mapper doesn't let the detail get in the way of the gameplay.

Wait, you mean it's not the other way around?! I've been doing it completely wrong this whole time! Ugh!!!

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Old Post 01-03-09 01:47 #
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Mike.Reiner
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esselfortium said:
Wait, you mean it's not the other way around?! I've been doing it completely wrong this whole time! Ugh!!!


With how some wads are, you'd think that was the case.
Old Post 01-03-09 04:05 #
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esselfortium
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Tip 4: How to Make Foolproof Monster Teleports in Boom

I read a post a while back stating that the method of using Boom's conveyor belts to teleport monsters into a map was unreliable: the monster is only given one chance to teleport into the map, and its teleport spot could potentially have a player or another monster standing on it, thus preventing the monster from teleporting in successfully. As a result, the monster would remain stuck in its little off-map sector forever, just getting scrolled continuously into a solid wall, and it'd be impossible to get 100% kills on the level.

Until I read that post, I never even thought of the possibility of such a problem, and I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of other people haven't thought of it either.

The solution is remarkably simple: put the monster in a teleport loop in its off-map starting area.

Here's a visual demonstration of how the setup looks in Doom Builder, with explanations of what everything does. It's mostly just the standard setup, but I figured I might as well explain all of it for anyone who isn't familiar with the technique already:

http://essel.spork-chan.net/gfx/mappingtips/teleport-demo.png

The easiest way to test whether your foolproof Boom teleport has been set up correctly is to place some monsters directly on top of the teleport spots, and make them face away from you, so that they'll just stand in place. Cause the teleport trigger to occur, and wait...the monsters won't teleport in. Now, fire once or move into their line of sight to wake the space-occupying monsters up and make them start walking around. If you've done it correctly, the monsters will be teleported onto the destinations as expected soon afterwards. :)

One thing that's important to keep in mind is that if you're teleporting in multiple monsters from different sectors, each of them needs to have a separate teleport-loop line tag, or else they'll all end up teleporting into each other in one of the dummy teleport-from sectors. It should be possible, though, to just make one wide sector with all of them side by side, individual monster-teleport lines, and a single long silent-teleport line for the loop.

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Last edited by esselfortium on 12-30-11 at 06:53
Old Post 01-18-09 11:23 #
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DooMAD
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I had a nice solution for reliable en-masse monster teleports, I'll post it up later.
Old Post 01-18-09 12:55 #
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Patrick
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new esselmagic for the new year
Old Post 01-18-09 14:32 #
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DooMAD
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As promised, my patented Merry-Go-Round-Multi-Teleporter (no, I couldn't think of a better name, sod off).

http://www.teamhellspawn.com/multiteleport.gif

Simply open the door/raise ceiling/lower floor when you want them to spawn. You can also tag the door linedefs as teleport lines if you choose. If you want them to be awake upon teleporting, you'll need to merge the sector they're initially standing in with a sector in your map the player will be firing in.

Note: You shouldn't mix flying monsters in, as they're not affected by scrolling floors and could clog things up. Maybe using Hexen's wind effect could work for that, I haven't tested it.

Sometimes large enemies like the mancubus and arachnotron don't mix in well either. It's best to give them their own larger sectors to spin round in.

Last edited by DooMAD on 01-18-09 at 18:55
Old Post 01-18-09 18:36 #
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esselfortium
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Neat! Thanks for that, DooMAD!

Speaking of flying monsters, does anybody have a reliable way of forcing them to teleport in Boom? I know there's always the standard vanilla method, but then there's the (exploitable) chance of them not waking up if you don't make noise in the designated areas...

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Old Post 01-18-09 19:00 #
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DooMAD
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I never got round to checking if you could get flying monsters to be pushed on a scrolling floor if you set the ceiling height so that they're touching the floor. Say make the room 56 units tall for the caco. Just make sure you don't use a door to let him out, since it stops 4 units short of the ceiling and it'll get stuck. Just a thought though, probably won't work, heh.
Old Post 01-18-09 19:08 #
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