Level Design Help Files

[text_fish]

I figured out that the material problem went back to Blender afterall. I'd missed a checkbox that overrides the Blender material name so the SMD was looking for a nonexistent material! StudioCompiler still comes up with the above error but it's just as easy (and probably more flexible) to use VTFEdit for that bit anyway.

 

Thanks for the help Squad.

[text_fish]

Apologies for making this discussion about modelling as opposed to level design again, but I'm running in to a brand new problem making props for CS:GO. It's best illustrated with a video and some hot music:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_TmEPiYJ2IE

 

As you can see, the lighting of this prop has gone a bit mental as it falls in to almost complete shadow at a certain distance. This occurs in Model Viewer (shown) as well as Hammer and in-game. I've tried reducing the VMF to its most basic elements (no spec, bump, etc.) to no avail. There we no unusual errors when I compiled the QC (I pretty much always see the following warning, but up until recently have experienced no repercussions):

 

WARNING: 

Model has 2-dimensional geometry (less than 0.500 inches thick on any axis)!!!

 

 

Has anybody else had this problem before, or have any ideas what I'm missing?

 

Cheers.

Edited January 8, 2014 by text_fish

[Squad]

Could you post the contents of the vmt file for the material?

[text_fish]

Gladly. Thanks for taking a look Squad:

 

 

"VertexlitGeneric"

{

"$basetexture" "models/textfish/freezer_door"

"$surfaceprop" "Metal"

"$envmap" "env_cubemap"

"$envmapmask" "models/textfish/freezer_door_spec"

}

 

I've tried with and without the specular stuff and with the default surface prop but the problem persists. Don't think there's anything else I can change.

 

 

Edited January 8, 2014 by text_fish

[Squad]

Not sure, but try adding $model "1" and see if that fixes anything.

[text_fish]

Hi Squad, thanks for the suggestion but that wasn't it. However, I ran that command through VDC to find out more about it which eventually led to my reading about mipmapping, which then reminded me that I'd been fiddling around with the mipmap settings in VTFEdit's import screen and when I reverted them to normal and re-imported the VTF I fixed the problem! So in a roundabout sort of way you fixed my problem one again, thank you!

[Squad]

Cool, glad I helped somehow

[kinggambit]

EDIT: Welp I forgot to convert to func_areaportal... 

Edited March 22, 2014 by kinggambit

[mr.P]

WARNING: 

Model has 2-dimensional geometry (less than 0.500 inches thick on any axis)!!!

 

 

Has anybody else had this problem before, or have any ideas what I'm missing?

 

Cheers.

 

got this when I tried to make a hull col from a face, finding the bad collision fixed this issue

[Patrick_H]

Hey all, after messing around in Radiant, UnrealEd, etc. for years, I am finally poking around in Hammer after god knows how many hours playing TF2.

 

...but then I discovered an uncomfortable limitation!

 

I was stuck with WASD to navigate in the 3d window.

 

I am sure many of you are aware and unaffected by this completely, but I have been mapping for many, many years using 3d mouselook and the arrow keys to navigate, perhaps from mousing left handed.

 

Imagine my horror when I discovered Valve had no interest in allowing customizable keyboard hotkeys.

 

So, in desperation, I attempted an external solution to this limitation: AutoHotKey

 

Using this program I was able to remap certain keys while in the Hammer editor.

 

Remap Hammer Hotkeys for Left Handed 3D Navigation

 

Step 1: install AutoHotKey
https://github.com/AutoHotkey/AutoHotkey/releases/download/v1.0.48.05/AutoHotkey104805_Install.exe

Step 2: Run AutoHotkey and right click where you want to save your script

Step 3: Open up the script (.ahk) in the text editor of your choice

Step 4: Paste the following into the script file

Run, Hammer.exe, C:Program Files (x86)SteamSteamAppscommonTeam Fortress 2bin

#IfWinActive ahk_class VALVEWORLDCRAFT
left::a
down::s
right:
up::w
MButton::z

Suspend ;this suspends the script so that you can type without hotkeys active
Exit ;End this block of code

 

 

Step 5: Right click on your script and choose compile script

 

Step 6: AutoHotKey will start up Hammer but now your arrow keys will also control your 3dmovement.

Click middle mouse button to toggle mouselook on and off

 

Hope this helps lefties. My apologies if this was already posted, but I couldn't find a solution.

Cheers!

 

Edited July 8, 2014 by Patrick_H

[KERQ]

Hello everyone, new poster here.

 

I've been playing CS since 1.6 with competitive in mind, but I really love Design, from UI, Web to Level and I've also tried 2D for skins.

But I have a passion for Level Design especially for Source Engine ( CS GO now ) and I've recently decided to give it a go, but it isn't being easy to start obviously haha

 

I've found some good begginer tutorials here:

http://www.worldofleveldesign.com/categories/cat_csgo.php

http://3kliksphilip.com/tutorials/sdk.html

 

But I would love to get more and more detailed ones too, explaining how to detail a map and such, that would be great.

 

Also, how do you guys would recommend me to start? I started sketching and creating some competitive map ideas, is it ok to start doing competitive maps in the beginning or should I do different stuff?

[text_fish]

Hi Kerq, you should check out TopHattWaffle's tutorials: http://www.tophattwaffle.com/

He's made loads of great tut's over the years and he's still at it, so there's some good up-to-date ones covering more recent technical advances in the source engine.

 

If I were you I'd start by making a sort of "playground" map including all the most wild and wonderful ideas you can think up just to get a good understanding of the engine, then you'll be better equipped to design and build a competitive map. Once you start your comp map it is good to have some sketches but don't spend too long on them because until you've built a rough version of the map in the editor you won't really get a feel for how it plays and you might need to go back to the drawing board if part of it doesn't work out how you'd hoped in your sketch. Hope that makes sense.

[KERQ]

Wow thank you so much for the link to TopHattWaffle's tutorials, loads of tutorials and useful stuff to download 

 

That makes total sense I've actually read that in a tutorial about competitive map design so you're totally right.

Your suggestion is actually the most correct thing to do, I'll probably do some sort of aim maps with some of my ideas and try to detail them. 

 

Oh and I'll probably start to be active here 

[El_Exodus]

I had more or less the same thing in my mind. I started using the CSGO SDK only about 3 or 4 months ago. I began creating just a very very simple level at first to get used to the Hammer editor.

My target now is to create/finish a comp map, too. I'm already working on it btw () I started with sketching and thinking about the layouts of the most popular maps, and what makes them good. But i didn't waste too much time on that. As text_fish said, just begin to build the layout as a greybox and test it. You'll see pretty fast if the layout has a future or not. And if it has a future, you'll find the things you have to change, to make it fun.

 

I don't actually know if it was right, to make a comp map at first, but i'm optimistic Good luck with your mapping

[Vaya]

The lighting on my map has suddenly disappeared on the compile. Has anyone had this? This includes about 50 static lights and a light_env...

 

It still shows as part of the VMF but doesn't seem to be considered when hammer is compiling...