.Map :: MoHAA Mapping

Whats so good about detail brushes? Do they improve FPS?

The compilers make cuts in your map for vis along the faces of structural brushes . It devides the map into volumes that contain no structural brushes then decides which volumes can see other volumes with out passing through structural brushes . So it makes cuts for all structual brushes if you have fewer structural brushes you get a faster vis time . You need to leave the major walls , ceilling , floor etc structural to block vis but the other things like trim , stairs and small brushes that don't block vis can be made detail so they are ignored dureing the vis stage of compile . It give you a smaller vis data size . Brushes with transparent textures are also ignored as well as meshes and terain .

i only get 10% of what you said lololol, but basicly it just makes the vis compile better. And FPS will be better in some parts, i had a map with about 16brushes in 1 place, they werent detaild, now they are detail and FPS is better...

whats the difference between detail and structural?

Make a couple of things detail and then use some view->filters to filter out detail brushes meshes , entities and terain . Now look at your map that is what the vis stage sees . It cuts the map along structural brushes it sort of makes boxes out of the empty spaces that do not contain structural brushes . If you can draw a line from one of these boxes to another one with out passing through a stuctural brush then both areas draw lowering frames per second . In other words one area can see the other . Brushes with a solid texture with no transparency are structural . Hint brushes and chaulk are structural . No draw is not structural. You can make a building with no windows and area portals in the doors . When your are inside the building and the doors are closed ( do it in single player you also may also need cheats enabled ) type r_showtris 3 , r_showtris 2 or r_showtris 1 into the console . You will see a wireframe of what is being drawn . Now open the door and see how it changes . With the door open the outside draws . With the door closed the outside does not draw . Of course make your walls floor and ceiling sturctural .

Try this link to see what i mean

http://www.gamedesign.net/archive/old.g ... Visibility

Take a look at this...might help!

storm, thanks that really cleard stuff up, the other one was a little complex for me but i did pick up a few things about wtf hint actually is lol. thanks.