in the tutorials the section on bsp selection was brief at best, waht do all these different choices mean?
what bsp do i need to use for say… a map with easyGEN terrain, a few buildings, and the standard spawn points?
bsp
SCDS_reyalP
(SCDS_reyalP)
#3
A full compile of an quake3 engine map has three passes. Each pass is done by invoking q3map with different options.
Which options you choose doesn’t depend much on the content of your map. It depends on what you want to do with the results.
Grossly simplified:
bsp = turns the map into a .bsp format. You have to to this to load the map at all.
-vis = calculate what parts of the map can be seen from where. You should do at least a -vis -fast.
-light = calculate lighting for your map.
These need to be done in order. Each one has a number of options. To test a map you should do at least a bsp and a vis -fast.
If you are using the menu from gtkradiant, the items listed as ‘single’ only do one of these passes. So to test a map, you would first invoke the folllowing, in order:
Q3map2 (single) BSP -meta
Q3map2 (single) -vis -fast
For a compile with full -vis and lighting you would do
Q3map2 (single) BSP -meta
Q3map2 (single) -vis
Q3map2 (single) -light -fast
Some of the menu options do all three passes in one command, such as
bsp_Q3Map2: (test) BSP -meta, -vis, -light -fast -filter
The ones that say (test) are suitable for testing your map. The ones that say (final) are higher quality.
the fast in -vis -fast refers to the compile time, at the cost of in game performance. For final compiles you should use just -vis.
The fast in -light -fast is OK to use for final compiles. While it produces results which are different than without -fast, they are not specifically lower quality, and the speed increase allows you to use other options which give better overall quality. Using -light -fast does not change ingame performance.
You can also add your own options to the menu, using the project settings dialog. The q3map2 manual tells you more about the individual options.
Loffy
(Loffy)
#4
What is a vis compile time, for a map of significant size (like Goldrush)? Approximatley. (And what machines where used for that compiling? Standard pc’s?) Just curious. // Loffy
sock
(sock)
#5
SD had several dual xenon processor compiler servers which did all the compiles of the maps. With a bouncelight of 8 this often took over night to complete.
Sock
:moo: