Slade question (auto sector generation)

[DeathMetalAccountant]

Hello all. I'm using Slade and I've run into a problem.

Simply put: is there any way to make Slade stop automatically generating sectors as soon as you've closed a polygon with the line drawing tool? There's a part of my map I'd like to leave in the void, but Slade keeps turning it into a sector, making all the lines that touch it two-sided and ruining their texture assignments - which is a big deal because it's over 100 lines that would need to be redone. I feel like this SHOULD be as simple as ticking a checkbox to disable automatic sectors, drawing the necessary lines, manually creating the sector I actually want, and then re-enabling the "feature" to proceed as normal. But even if that's possible, I can't seem to find the box.

Halp?

[tomatoKetchup]

I don't map using Slade, I use DB2 instead, and generally when I want to draw a series of lines that doesn't form a sector, I just make sure I don't close the polygon. So basically, just put the start and end points of your polygon very close to each other, so it gives the impression it's close without being.

May I ask you why you want to do that by the way? I can't think of any scenario when you'd want such a thing.

[sirjuddington]

There isn't a way to disable it currently, since it's pretty rare that you'd want it to be. What you can do if you want to add lines without sectors, is create the vertices manually, select them in order and press INS like in DEU.

[scifista42]

Do you just mean a piece of void enclosed by a sector (or multiple sectors) from all sides? For example a void pillar out of 1-sided lines in the middle of a sector? I guess you just need to delete the newly created sector, which should turn the lines around it to 1-sided, then retexture these lines.

Or do you mean some kind of trickery where you want the player to look or walk into the void? Thing is, the playable area needs to consist of closed sectors to work properly. Unclosed sectors create visual glitches and physics don't work as usual in the void, that's why you shouldn't do this, unless you're aiming for some extremely hacky and clever engine trick.

[andrewj]

Pehaps you can create the last vertex near the first one, and then use a vertex merge function?

[DeathMetalAccountant]

I guess I made the situation sound more complicated than it is. The map has an area with two different floor heights that (in singleplayer) will be approached from one direction and then the other - typical SP layout. But when I try to draw the sector that will connect the two paths, Slade insists on turning the entire void into a sector instead, which destroys not only the texture assignments, but the floor heights as well.

Here's an example of what I'm talking about in E1M5, along with screenshots of what happens in Slade if I tried to build E1M5 in an editor with automatic sectors. (aaaah!)



Granted I haven't mapped for Doom since 1996, but this was far easier to do on some DOS-based editors back in the day (Dmapedit, anyone?). Of course there are ways around this - I could draw the inside walls first, delete the sector, and then connect the outside walls to them. Or draw the rooms layout without adjusting wall textures or floor heights until completing the loop. Or just bite the bullet and re-texture every single line and adjust every single floor height that is discarded when I try to make the connection. But all of these options seem so silly from a workflow perspective that I assumed there must be a way to just turn the dumb autosectors off for a minute. :(

[DeathMetalAccountant]

andrewj said:

Pehaps you can create the last vertex near the first one, and then use a vertex merge function?

That crashed the editor :/

[scifista42]

DeathMetalAccountant said:

http://postimg.org/image/jdl5e4ash/

Don't ever draw individual linedefs into the void, and don't ever draw sectors by placing linedefs one by one. Use sector mode to draw an entire polygon at once. This polygon will become the new sector, and no undesired sectors should be created. So, if you want to connect 2 rooms by a window, just go to sector mode and draw a rectangular sector = the window. Then the other undesired sector should not appear.

[DeathMetalAccountant]

scifista42 said:

Don't ever draw individual linedefs into the void, and don't ever draw sectors by placing linedefs one by one. Use sector mode to draw an entire polygon at once. This polygon will become the new sector, and no undesired sectors should be created. So, if you want to connect 2 rooms by a window, just go to sector mode and draw a rectangular sector = the window. Then the other undesired sector should not appear.

Head. Desk. That works (of course). Thank you very much!