Hammer Map Editor, CrashCrashCrash!!!

[MrBlah]

Is it just me or am I really really good at over stressing hammer and making it crash? Ive managed to do it 3 times in the short time ive used the program, all from putting it under to much stress

[Blackblood]

idk how you people make it crash the only problem I had was launching, but I googled it and fixed the launch. Google is my tool for success!

[l3eeron]

Ya Hammer can be touchy... Ive lost tons of stuff because it crashes.

Main thing is to run it stream lined as possible like I was saying earlier. Go into view options and turn everything off and use only what is needed.

Another thing that might be causing too much stress is the size of your "room" I noticed from the screen shot there isnt a skybox yet, just a huge room. Hammer prolly doesnt like that.

Follow step3 from my tut to make a skybox:

Step 3 : Create the sky. With the entire hollow cube selected use the clip tool (on the left, the one with the corner of the cube cut off, second one up from the bottom) to cut off a part of the cube. Drag a line across the cube in either of the two bottom windows (side or front). After you drag the line accross the cube, hit shift/x until both halves are highlighted in white[albumimg]115[/albumimg]. Then hit enter to complete the "split" Now you have a hollow cube, split into halves. Make sure the select tool is selected. On the menu bar click the "ig" (ignore group) icon. go to your side or front view window and select (draw a box around the upper parts) only the top halve[albumimg]117[/albumimg]. Now go to the texture window and hit browse. In the filter type toolssky. double click the tools/toolsskybox material. Now on the tool bar click the apply texture button (4th one up). That should change all your brushes up in the "sky" to the skybox texture and leave all the lower brushes concrete[albumimg]118[/albumimg]. SAAAAAAVVVVVEEEE!!!!!! The skybox texture will look like sky when the map is compiled and ran =)

[MrBlah]

lol its not crashing that way im carving apparently tooooooo much for it to handle lol

[l3eeron]

carving is bad mmkay

Seriously, dont carve unless its a super clean/easy thing for hammer to do. Something like carving a small square out of a big square is ok. But, dont do something like: make a rounded triangle and try to carve a cylinder into it. That will surely be some messy brush work. Even if hammer doesnt crash and the map compiles it will make for bad FPS on the client's end.

Make primitives and use clipping tool


Oh and try to work on the biggest grid you can to keep everything snapped together. I try not to go below grid size of 4, or 2. When you get down to grid size 1, it gets messy. If you make a box that is an odd number (15x15x15) you can't split it in half and keep it snapped on grid. You'll end up with two boxes 7.5x7.5x15 which is bad .... mm kay

[MrBlah]

i only use even numbers when im down to grid lvl 1 anyway, and i have solved the problem so is good. After about 3 or 4 redos i have finally stopped tryin to do it the easy way... everything will be clean cut and all, no stray lines here or there.

[l3eeron]

Good man Blah... you will be a good mapper

[MrBlah]

im just having trouble deciding if i should have the ice the cut off at the outside of the boards or the inside, right at contact.

[l3eeron]

Here's how I would make the rink.

Start by making an oval using the primitive/cylinder tool.

Make it appropriate size and number of sides (16 sides ought a be good?)


Make the big oval hollow (select oval, hit ctrl+h make walls 16 or so thick)

Now you have a hallow oval. Click the "ig" ignore group button and select only the top brush and delete it. Now use clip tool to cut out the square doorways to allow players in.


Finally, texture appropriately.

This method will yeild a perfectly snapped together, easy to render, fps friendly "rink".

(click)

[MrBlah]

ill post an uptodate picture here in a bit, just gunna finish up a couple of things and it should be good enough for picture. (it could take me an hour )