[MAPPING] 45° Stairs

[ZeroKnight]

So, I just started mapping the other day, and I'm working on a map that employs a small set of stairs. The way the map is shaped requires the stairs to be diagonal, which end up being at 45°. Due to a style preference, I have made the steps very small in inclination, and there are therefore a lot of them. The geometry grid shows a hell of a lot of fine gridlines. Does that equal polygon count? Or is that just how it's going to be lit? Because having made these stairs, I notice a fair amount of lag on the map, though I don't know if it's my lame hardware (I mean really lame...I play RE at an average 20 FPS), or if it's just the rendering of the gridlines themselves.

Is there a polygon count in the bottom right info? If so, how many polygons does it take to start making a map laggy? I noticed that almost all maps in RE, if not all of them, use ramps instead of stairs. This leads me to believe that it may indeed be a polygon issue, which is why they are ramps. Could I get an opinion on this? I would love to keep my staircase, as it will fit the theme of the map when I get to that point. I have extremely limited mapping experience; the only other mapping engine I've played around with was Apogee's Build Engine (Duke Nukem 3D and Shadow Warrior) and the modern port of it, Mapster32.

So. Halp? Pics and map included.

hexx.7z

(66.26 KiB) Downloaded 191 times

[kr1egsgott]

Seems like you already found the /remip command
Can't answer this whole stuff but I've noticed the steps are all too small. I would suggest to make them 4 times as height.
ps: pls use zip (linux)

[LuckyStrike-Rx]

Even after remip I notice a small frame drop(200 to 180) (200 to 60 without remip) when I look the stairs(and I have a good graphic card). making them a bit less small may save alot. I think there's some 45° stairs in sauer may worth taking a look on how it's done to not subdivide to much. I have no idea how to do this correctly

[qreeves]

Second-most from the bottom, a line reads: wtr:Xk(X%) wvt:Xk(X%) evt:Xk eva:Xk - these show you how many triangles are being rendered in the current view. You have indeed made it worse by using the angle you have, as it doesn't align with the grid nicely, but I don't see a particular issue with the current number of triangles. The map "ares", previously seen on this forum, had a wtr of about 200k (or, 200000 triangles, in most views) due to the lack of occlusion (a process by which you obscure the view of certain areas by creating walls/mountains/etc to reduce the number of triangles needing to be rendered at once) by geometry, this makes that map lag pretty badly (a bit like "dawn", its included in the release, but not in the main rotations).

[ZeroKnight]

Thank you all for the feedback. Now, I'd like an opinion from an experienced mapper; should I just:

• Skip the stairs and make a ramp?
• Make larger steps?
• <insert option here>?

I do like the small stairs, but I wouldn't be against making them larger if that would help without needing a ramp.

@quin
May I ask what each abbreviation stands for? I may just be slow at the moment, but I can't seem to guess them. That and being new to mapping may have something to do with it.

[EDIT]
@krieg
I used 7z to keep the attachment size small for convenience. ZIP has poor compression rates, IMO. Though unless .MPZ files are already compressed, this wouldn't matter. However, I do not know that. I would have just used .TAR.BZ2 as it's a great compression method, but then people on windows would have a hard time. Can't please everyone.

[qreeves]

May I ask what each abbreviation stands for? I may just be slow at the moment, but I can't seem to guess them. That and being new to mapping may have something to do with it.

I have no bloody idea myself, haha. I think "wtr" is "world triangles", that's about it. eihrul just says "look at X" so I look at it and go, "oh, ok".

I used 7z to keep the attachment size small for convenience. ZIP has poor compression rates, IMO. Though unless .MPZ files are already compressed, this wouldn't matter. However, I do not know that. I would have just used .TAR.BZ2 as it's a great compression method, but then people on windows would have a hard time. Can't please everyone.

MPZ files are already compressed (it literally means, map zip), the engine writes the file (and the accompanying PNG) in a compressed format using level 9 (best) ZLIB compression, you're not going to get much more out of it really (other than to compress the CFG a little more). Just use a ZIP to contain files in a package, it is the most universal format and why people prefer it.

[Ulukai]

May I ask what each abbreviation stands for? I may just be slow at the moment, but I can't seem to guess them. That and being new to mapping may have something to do with it.

I have no bloody idea myself, haha. I think "wtr" is "world triangles", that's about it. eihrul just says "look at X" so I look at it and go, "oh, ok".

I used 7z to keep the attachment size small for convenience. ZIP has poor compression rates, IMO. Though unless .MPZ files are already compressed, this wouldn't matter. However, I do not know that. I would have just used .TAR.BZ2 as it's a great compression method, but then people on windows would have a hard time. Can't please everyone.

MPZ files are already compressed (it literally means, map zip), the engine writes the file (and the accompanying PNG) in a compressed format using level 9 (best) ZLIB compression, you're not going to get much more out of it really (other than to compress the CFG a little more). Just use a ZIP to contain files in a package, it is the most universal format and why people prefer it.

I would just like to add to this that Linux can unpack .7z files as well. Every distro provides packages for this, but these are mostly not installed by default. But indeed, .ZIP is the most universal. Just like how .MP3 is the most popular audio format, despite being not the best at all

[kr1egsgott]

OT: i can unpack 7z by use of the console, and yes im lazy.
Make the steps bigger, it will even look better imho.

[ZeroKnight]

eihrul just says "look at X" so I look at it and go, "oh, ok".

Haha, then I will do the same. Is there a certain number I should try to keep it below? Or just as little as possible?

MPZ files are already compressed (it literally means, map zip)

Oh, what a quaint name :) Okay, noted. Depending on what I'm distributing, I'll use .ZIP. If it can stand to be compressed, I shall use .7z.

And about the stairs, right now I'm not all concerned with what will look "better", in my own opinion or of someone else. What I want to know is, will the small stairs use an excessive amount of resources, that could be mitigated by changing the step size? Or are they fine now? Or is resources used a negligible amount, and can be overlooked? That's the question I would like answered.

[qreeves]

And about the stairs, right now I'm not all concerned with what will look "better", in my own opinion or of someone else. What I want to know is, will the small stairs use an excessive amount of resources, that could be mitigated by changing the step size? Or are they fine now? Or is resources used a negligible amount, and can be overlooked? That's the question I would like answered.

I don't see it being an issue, unless you use a LOT of small geometry in a single (unoccluded) area.

[ZeroKnight]

Okay, there wont be many more stairs than that. That's all I wanted to know. Thank you :)