P.S. I can map now, trust me. I know how to use every tool (except Carve) and every entity (including brush entities like func_rotatings).

Keep on doing whatever it is you do, I'll get back to making personal maps for HL2 and playing Black Mesa.

HalfPortalLife3 wrote:
Namicomata
She

portal2tenacious wrote:
What exactly is the carve tool? I guess its probably good I don't know about it, but what's so terrible?

In theory carve tool is amazing; you let two brushes intersect and the carve tool carves a hole in the surface.

In 99.95% of the cases however it goes wrong. The algorithm often makes bad decisions, with can give:
* Problems when re-scaling your brush.
* Microbrushes
* Wrecked up visleaves.

The clip tool can do precisely the same, but it requires a few more actions. it does give you a lot
more control though. If you can handle the clip tool, you should totally use that rather then the carve tool. If you can't handle the clip tool, stop now and learn to use it. Don't come back before you know how to use it.

npc_msleeper_boss wrote:
HalfPortalLife3 wrote:

Namicomata
She

What's the big deal mslipper?

Lpfreaky90 wrote:
portal2tenacious wrote:

What exactly is the carve tool? I guess its probably good I don't know about it, but what's so terrible?

In theory carve tool is amazing; you let two brushes intersect and the carve tool carves a hole in the surface.

In 99.95% of the cases however it goes wrong. The algorithm often makes bad decisions, with can give:
* Problems when re-scaling your brush.
* Microbrushes
* Wrecked up visleaves.

The clip tool can do precisely the same, but it requires a few more actions. it does give you a lot
more control though. If you can handle the clip tool, you should totally use that rather then the carve tool. If you can't handle the clip tool, stop now and learn to use it. Don't come back before you know how to use it.

This is the example I usually give, taking carving to the extreme: http://i.imgur.com/yqGm5.png
That is four spheres carved into each other. The blue lines in the 3D view are the edges of visleaves.
Nacimota used to have a fantastic article about it on his website but it's currently down.

UsCobra11 wrote:
What's the big deal mslipper?

I see what you did there UsCubra11.

HalfPortalLife3 wrote:
I can map now, trust me. I know how to use every tool

I know how to use a hammer and a screwdriver, but that doesn't mean I can build a good house hehe

wrathofmobius wrote:
This is the example I usually give, taking carving to the extreme: http://i.imgur.com/yqGm5.png

you should totally check out this amazing video on youtube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xh9Kr2iO4XI
If you manage to actually compile a map with terrain that is made with this method we will probably ban you

terrain -> displacements.
Cutting stuff from other stuff -> clip tool.

Lpfreaky90 wrote:
Possibly the worst SDK video of all time

FelixGriffin wrote:
Also, NEVER clip or carve something with indicator lights on it. "Accessed Deleted Entity. Tell a programmer!" Nothing big happens...except that every lidlight on that section has the Brush Face field cleared out.

Just, never, carve.

As for the clip part, it's perfectly fine to cut something with indicator lights on it! The thing is that your brushes won't have the same brush id's anymore. Basically, if you'd have a box say 128x128x128 inside you have 6x6 faces. Since you need 6 brushes to conceal the block, and each brush has 6 sides as well.
We created those brushes first so basically face 1-36 are taken.

Now we apply an overlay (like indicator lights) to face 4. (this means brush 1) if we cut this in half we suddenly have 2 brushes, rather then 1. So 12 brushes rather then 6. This means that all sides get a new number, since there are two new brushes. To prevent errors, hammer continues after 36, so our two new brushes will get the face id's to 48. (Note that 1-6 are empty now)

Because we applied the overlay to face 4 and it's gone now, the overlay does not show up again. The easiest way to fix this is to select the overlay, open the overlay's properties and go to "Brush faces..." and then use the "pick" button to select the brush face where the overlay is on and it shows up perfectly again!

Lpfreaky90 wrote:
The only way to fix this is to select the overlay again, and apply it to one of the new faces, and it shows up perfectly again!

Nope... there is still another way if the overlay is already placed on a brush surface that has been clipped: open the overlay's properties and go to "Brush faces..." and then use the "pick" button to select the brush face where the overlay is on.

josepezdj wrote:
Lpfreaky90 wrote:

The only way to fix this is to select the overlay again, and apply it to one of the new faces, and it shows up perfectly again!

Nope... there is still another way if the overlay is already placed on a brush surface that has been clipped: open the overlay's properties and go to "Brush faces..." and then use the "pick" button to select the brush face where the overlay is on.

sorry, I re-phrased this the wrong way. Your method is absolutely the easiest way to fix this.

narsqrd wrote:
HalfPortalLife3 wrote:

I can map now, trust me. I know how to use every tool

I know how to use a hammer and a screwdriver, but that doesn't mean I can build a good house hehe

Aren't you forgetting a saw and dirt moving tools? Housebuilder pfft

wrathofmobius wrote:
This is the example I usually give, taking carving to the extreme: http://i.imgur.com/yqGm5.png
That is four spheres carved into each other. The blue lines in the 3D view are the edges of visleaves.
I see what you did there UsCubra11.

those kinds of visleafs would probably happen with 3 spheres anyways.... func_detail everything.... and aslong as you only are making 1 clip into a brush, its really no big deal

but it is still a bad too, and shouldn't be used often

FelixGriffin wrote:
I've been using the carve tool to make sqaure holes in the walls to put my door and boxdropper instances into. I thought that wasn't too bad for visleaves and such? I could use the clip tool as well, but it takes longer and gives the same result.

What I think is that it does NOT give the same result. If you obtained the same result must be only by coincidence. As said above the carve tool algorithm makes many unecessary brush pieces... Please check the attached door frame I made by clipping and using the vertex tool. Whenever the carve tool could be remotely useful, the vertex tool, altogether with the clipping tool, will get over it by far

Carve gave me two pieces on the sides, one on the top, and one on the bottom.