[CS:GO] Water bugging/cutting?

[Spherix]

So I was trying to add some water to a small experiment map of mine and I noticed that on every edge where the water touches other objects, it sort of cuts trough.

Tried a number of water textures, all sides but the top have been nodraw'ed. Am I missing something?

[JeanPaul]

No really though, do you have any leaks? It might just be something you have to deal with which isnt that bad considering its a very minor problem.

Or maybe just have the water clipped to the exact size of the area needed rather than just slicing through the geometry.

Edited June 17, 2013 by JeanPaul

[Spherix]

Hehehe, nice image.

No pointfile is generated, so I assume there is no leak; can't visually see one either. And as for the clipping, I have already done this it does it on every single edge. I compiled a demo map that had multiple types of water on it, same issue. Added the water controller water_lod_control and a bunch of cubemaps; built cubemaps as well -> no result.

Edit: I notice that it doesn't occur when I use the _cheap water textures; but as they look, well, cheap.. I don't want to use those. There's plenty of maps where this works fine in cs:go, so there must be something I'm not doing right here...

Edit2: I've made a small test level with a hollowed cube, a box to stand on and some water, works flawless.. I have _no_ idea what is causing my glitch now =/

Edit3: I went nuts and redid all the water in a more intense way (resulting in a lot more blocks), same result. If I use noclip to sit on the waterline itself, i can see trough the entire world at that height. Is the noclip screwing things up or something? It still doesn't say there is a leak or anything..

Edit 4: Can't let this rest..

Made a small box with water in it in the same map, seemed good at first, untill viewed from certain angle -> same issue.

It appears to me the nodraw is what is causing the error: As seen in the screenshot, the insides of the box get seetrough once i go outside of the map, but if the box is viewed from the outside, you cannot see trough. The inside of the walls of the box are textures, so in theory that should not be see through. The outside of the water is however nodraw as suggested by valve themselves, which seem to cause this issue now? I'm confused.

Edited June 17, 2013 by Spherix

[Spherix]

I've done some more testing with a boxed map with various water:

- if I kept 1 unit of space inbetween the walls/basin and the water, you could see trough the walls from within the water

- if the water was measured to the walls of the basin (no units inbetween) the line/clipping as in the screenshots above occured

- if the water overlapped the wall (with 4 units), the line got even bigger.

I looked for a prefab that had some water in it, assuming that would be as how water should be; I've downloaded this: http://css.gamebanana.com/prefabs/6260 and built it for cs;go, with dev_water5 texture applied cause the one that was on the map isnt in cs:go (shouldnt matter that its a css prefab). However, the same problem still occurs, a clear line can be seen on the edges of the water.

Could someone else build that prefab and tell me if they experience similar results? I'm starting to think Hammer is bugged

Edit: I have come to the conclusion that apparantly I am the first person to notice this/be annoyed by this. Even in official maps such as de_lake, you can still see that the edge of the water is causing the clipping line on brushes. The devs do 'cheat' a little by using similar colors in the water and the textures that surround the water, so the line is less noticable, something that isn't really possible in the map I'm making due to the fact that the water aligns to multiple surfaces with different textures and with that colors.

So.. no fancy water then?

Edited June 18, 2013 by Spherix

[FMPONE]

one solution depending on the function of the water would be to do what they did in the old militia for css, a model with flowering water/ moving texture simulating a flow. it's very difficultt o describe, but it's basically a moving overlay model on top of the water which makes it look like the water is touching the edge of the walls.

not ideal, obviously, but a cool effect if appropriate in your map

[Spherix]

One thing I did just notice in a last test is that there are two aztec textures for water (well, 3 actually but one is a _cheap texture). One of these aztec textures does not have the clipping problem, but when I dive into the water, visibility is zero; even if I add some lights under water for testing sake, i cant see anything in the water.

Problem seems to be lying in the way the engine deals with certain textures, and whilst the aztec texture that doesn't show the clipping looks great from above and i can see the bottom of the basin trough the water, but nothing once I dove in =/.

Too bad 1.6 textures look so damn retarded in a source environment, but they at least work @_@.

Nevermind the above, the texture that seemed to be correct was a replacement due to low graphic settings; it was using the cheap aztec texture.. Source.. sucks. -> only the _cheap textures don't have this problem.

Edited June 18, 2013 by Spherix

[RedYager]

Hello, I have seen these particular problems before. I am fairly sure that if you convert those cliffs into displacements, that you will no longer see these clipping issues. But remember that you can only convert quads into displacements so the top surface's may not currently be ideal. You can still control visibility by placing brushes within the displacements.

With regards to water surfaces disappearing at certain angles and a host of other related issues, water surfaces placed at different heights to each other can cause this. Check this out:

Requirements

To make it perform efficiently, water also has a collection of rules regarding its placement and usage inside of a map.

• There may be only one water level height in a PVS if the water is expensive.
  
• "Expensive" and "cheap" water may not be used simultaneously in the same PVS.
  
• The water's surface should never slope in the Z-axis; it should always be parallel to the horizon line in a map.
  
• Water is created by applying a water material to the top-most surface of a brush, while covering the remaining faces with the tools\toolsnodraw material.
  
• The water_lod_control entity controls the distance at which expensive water transitions into cheap water.
  
• An env_cubemap entity must be present for the water surface to render properly on sub-DX9 hardware.
  
• Areaportals may never cross the water surface.
  
• Water does not seal the map.
  
• Only the top of the brush renders correctly when seen. The sides and bottom are not rendered.
  

Water does not work with brush entities, and should not be attached to an entity. Water brushes included in any brush entity will not render correctly. The only exception isfunc_water_analog.

https://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/Adding_Water#Requirements

Hope you can solve this

[Spherix]

Hey there RedYager; thanks for the reply.

The water at floor level is all the same height and type, I've only got some extra water in a small cave that has a small entrance and exit; I'm not too familiar with PVS unfortunately so I couldn't tell if it's 'breaching' or not.

I've noticed one thing in the link you posted; In order for water surfaces to render correctly, it is necessary for your map to have a skybox, and the water brush itself rectangular.

I've currently got some water textures that are triangular instead of rectangular in my attempt to seal the level off correctly instead of mashing a giant cube all over my map.. is Valve saying I should just mash the giant cube on there? As for displacements, I really don't think I'm going to convert every single intersecting edge to a displacements; the map was meant as small climb map, ported from 1.6; it's not meant to look awesome, but I had no idea that adding water would be such an effort.. I'll attempt the giant cube, and whilst several water tutorial videos do show that displacements seem to work alright, I really don't think I'm even capable of putting such effort in the map in its current state... Besides that, it would be an idiotic requirement just to add water with a fancy texture =/

Edit: nope, changing the water to one enormous brush doesn't do the trick either; even removed other water elements that were not at same level..

Edited June 18, 2013 by Spherix

[RedYager]

From the look and scale of your map, I think you could easily get away with creating several larger water brushes. And for displacements, It wouldn't be too much effort to convert those cliffs into them, select the brushes, open the 'face edit sheet' or texture tool, de-select the bottom faces and then hit create displacement, just make sure the faces have four sides so you might have to clip them a bit.

[Spherix]

Bah.. I hate the fact that you are right about it now..

Now I cannot ignore the fact that I have to do all of them cause I can't be satisfied with cheap water textures.. I still think the requirement is very, very odd though.. Thanks for the help nonetheless!

[RedYager]

No problem