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Author Topic: Jump Mapping - 7 - Leaks  (Read 1401 times)
Offline  Drexen
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Posts: 282
1 - What is a leak

You see that blackness in the 3d view in hammer, it's called the void. Think of the void as outer space and think of your map as a space ship. If there's any holes between your space ship and space everyone's going to die. Well if you load up your map in tf2 and your map has a hole (leak) where you can see the void, well for one it's not a pretty sight seeing the void, but also it causes your whole map to be very laggy. So we need to find out how to find leaks and fix them.

2 - How leaks occur

As I said before, leaks are caused when theres a hole between the inside of your playable map and the void. Your map can only be sealed by solid blocks, so if there is a brush entity or a point entity (like a light) outside or trying to be a wall to seal in your map, it will cause a leak. (One other thing, displacements and water also don't seal in the map).

3 - Finding leaks

The simplest way to find a leak in your map is to use one of the tools in hammer called the point file. To generate a point file, compile your map with these settings:



Once its compiled. Close the compile log and click on map > load point file (point file, not portal file). If you get this message showing then well done, your map has a leak (or many).



One thing, I doubt your user name is Andrew and your map is called t1, but you get the idea. Alternatively, if you get this message showing, then you have no leaks and have nothing to worry about. (you can just close it).



So now, back to that message that means you have a leak, go ahead and press yes to load the point file.



Oh look, a red line has been drawn in your map. This shows you a path between an entity and the void. (your map has to have at least one entity in it to actually cause a leak). Although this is a really obvious example, I'll show some more complicated ones later on. So of course to fix the leak in my current map I need to put in the walls I forgot to add. Problem solved.

Remember to compile again and load point file to check that there aren't more leaks in your map. Once you get the message meaning there are no leaks, click map > unload point file.

4 - Complex leaks

Leaks as I said before, can occur in different ways. Take this example here:



Lolwut, the red line is going straight through a wall. As I said before, brush entities can't seal the world, and oh look, that wall is a func_brush. To fix this leak, we need to add another solid block behind it to seal the map again.



Another example of a complex leak is as shown:



As you can see here, it would appear that the red line is starting and ending in the void. This one needs some understanding about brush entities first. Brush entities have an origin, a centre point. This centre point is generated depending on the brush entities size and position, but it can sometimes end up lying outside in the void as shown in my example here:



Now that you understand what is causing the leak, the simplest way to solve it is just to add a small block that covers the origin:



There we go, when I compile and load point file again, no leaks! As you may have figured out from this, it is actually possible for example to cover your whole map in a brush entity (a trigger_hurt for example) and still have no leaks so long as the centre origin of the entity is covered. Neat eh?
   
Offline  Wolsk
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Posts: 301
i love you
I never knew you could solve a leak by just covering the origin. :O
That's pretty clever, and it will save me a lot of time.

Also, I was really hoping you'd make videos instead.
Videos are much MUCH easier to follow, in my opinion.
It also allows the viewers to see the entire process.

Stuff I want to know about are props and displacement.
I really don't know how to use them well. :/


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klanana:  I DID NOT EAT THE CAT
dellort: This mod is pretty cool, just wish the devs would fix the bug that allows MIKE to play on it.
   
Offline  Drexen
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Posts: 282
Since Cranck already said I should add it here, you can also solve leaks from brush ent origins by actualy moving the origin back into the playable area, just drag it in the 2d view, its a little circle...

Also, yeah I could add tutorials on props/displacements.
   
Fly
**

Posts: 61
Jon Bon Jovi of course
I am having problems to fix a leak, i know where the leak is but it shows me That it is behind a solid wall on which
 I have been using the geometry tool. Could anyone give me a solution?


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It wasn't me, but Jon Bon Jovi of course.
   
Offline  Drexen
Rocketeer
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Posts: 282
If its going through the 'solid wall' then its probably a brush entity, and needs a wall to seal it into the playable area... other than that I've no idea whats happening in your situation.
   
Fly
**

Posts: 61
Jon Bon Jovi of course
Thanks anyway i have heard i could use the health trigger which i was going to use no matter what had happened so i m going to try that. thanks for your help :D.


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It wasn't me, but Jon Bon Jovi of course.
   
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