JB-Monody (2004)

[Vatcilli zeitchef]

Hello Guys

I think you all know me by now as the annoying fool who has been spamming
this forum since the last month.
But I wanted to tell I Just started to try my luck on a UT2004 JB map
I called it JB-Monody. Though I'm dutch I remember that to be a song as a Tribute to the dead (or something like that)
For now it is only a mere deathmatch. But I'll upload it as a Double dom to Nalicity soon so you can check out the (small) but solid layout (in My opinion)
Here are some shots of my map (these I'll probably use as screenshots)

Shot 1: Yeah I know I keep posting shots of skyboxes but it is the only thing I always manage to make it work the way I want.

Shot2 : Since I can't see the shots while I'm typing this I gues this is the Red base. (for as far as I am now)
HEY WHO THE F**k ATE MY HEALTHVIALS?

Shot3 : The outside terrain I hope you like the abbadon theme becouse that's what you get when fighting on a planet that just survived a Nuclear war.

The Latest download link
JB-Monody(Alpha2)

[Vatcilli zeitchef]

I was planning to post my (alpha) map but the site I used to place them is down
Can anyone tell me what I must do now?

[The_Head]

Looks good so far, will be nice to take a proper look around.

I've got some webspace That I could upload it onto if you want. Check your pms


or read this thread: http://forums.beyondunreal.com/showthread.php?t=160296
- I can see you posted there already, but no harm in trying again.

[Vatcilli zeitchef]

Ok I think this should do the trick

Here is my map for as far it is (It is Double Domination now)
I'd like to know what you guy think of the theme and the layout.
I'm making an alternative route too.
(comments please)

____Edit____
Some extra screenies to go with.

[The_Head]

Not bad for a first effort with the editor.
Layout wise it sint too bad, perhaps make it slightly bigger in the outdoor area.
The terrain will need to be smoothed out a bit to get rid of edges that you can get stuck on (am sure you knew that already)
Weapon balance could be an issue in the outdoor area. With the shock at one end and the Flak and lightin at the other.

See the screeny:

with jailbreak you want a small easily defendable route to the switch. atm you do infact have this with only one entrance the indoor section, but in adding more routes I presume there will be more entrances. If that is the case you will want to move the switch and change the layout slightly. On the picture If you removed the 2 side entrances to the switch it would work well.
I guess that the 2 dead ends either side of the position of the screenshot will be the additional routes.

Good job so far, keep it up

[Vatcilli zeitchef]

Thanks For your comment Head.
The weapons were placed to make sure the
Players would leave the bases to get the good stuff.
I don't know how I could place them better though.
Any suggestions? I'm still changing the terrain but resizing it will take a lot of effort.
will take some time too, but I'll try.
How about scaling the outside area up with let's say 20%?

[The_Head]

Scaling should work. never tried it myself. on the weapon layout. You could only really tell how bad it is in a proper human match i guess. I'm no real expert on weapon layout. I have played IG for the most of my UT2004 life.

[Vatcilli zeitchef]

Gotta go for the weekend means no updates for now.
I did already scale the outside up but now I need to place
all deco and paths on the right place again.
I'll update this map when I come back sunday.
please try the map and tell me what you think of it
I'll add one alternative route
(C'mon it is not fun if you are the last
(Wo)man standing and there is only one way to the release)
Return with comment after playing it so I can finish it and make it real JB
Please?

[G.Lecter]

I tested it about 5 minutes, I couldn’t play more because it’s not very enjoyable with the plaerstarts beside the DOM points, and I also am busy with the CTF-Fragtion conversion...
- I agree with Head, smooth the terrain, you often get stuck in some places now.
- Definitely, add one or more ways to attack the bases.
- The bases actually are very cramped, I think you should make all the allways wider, rise the ceilings more, make the switch area more open, and add more z-axis...
- The assimetrical layout/placement is being a big problem now. The red team has not acess to the lighting gun so easily, the shield is a bit nearer the blue base... Try to make the layout and placement completely symetrical...
- Everyone uses the Minigun now, you could fix this placing another weapon inside and/or adding more variety of playerstarts.
- The healths out of the bases would be way better IMO
- Some more colour variation in the lighting would be cooler...
Keep working on it, it’s going very good for a first attempt with the UT2004 editor...

[Vatcilli zeitchef]

Thanks G lector I don't think I'll completely mirror the map but I will try equalize it more. As for the bases: Im workin on it as soon as I have time.
(I'm not home this weekend)

[Hazel.H]

I agree with The_Head and G.Lecter. I think the weapon placement needs changing, bots only seem to use the minigun at the moment! I had a quick look in the editor as well as playing it.

- You don't need so many pathnodes very close together. Here's something that might help if you need it
UnrealWiki Botpathing
Advanced botpathing tutorial
- Most maps with terrain have a way to get underneath it, even the official maps. To stop someone from falling through the terrain and walking around under the map, place a kill volume at the bottom of the subtracted area under the terrain.
- The textures in the base look low detail imo, you could change the texture scaling to 0.5 or 0.25
monody1.jpg
- Half of the map is very dark. As well as being hard to see, it might give an unfair advantage to one team in online play.
monody2.jpg
- There are some typos in the description, just thought I should point these out
inhabitans > inhabitants
carefull > careful
it's > its

keep it up

[Vatcilli zeitchef]

Thanks Hazel I'm changing the discription right away
I'm not planning to make the terrain mirrored but made some changes in weapon placement.
1 Replaced flakcannon with shock in a way Red can easely get it
2 Repaced old shock (which was easy to get for blue) with the BioRifle
3 Added an extra path to the Lightning gun for the Red team.
4 Moved the shield pack more to the middle

I'll update the download with this as soon as I get home.
Oh and I'm adding the volume. thanks for the tip.
also removing some of the else useless botpaths.


-__EDIT__-
One more question Hazel. In JB-Gravity you used a lot of custom meshes.
Do you know a program I can use to make them myself?
The lighting becomes horrible if I make them in ued.

Also what is the use for antiportals?

[G.Lecter]

Do you know a program I can use to make them myself?

3dsMax and Maya are the most used ones...

The lighting becomes horrible if I make them in ued.

Try lowering the Display -> ScaleGlow number if the meshes made in UED look too bright, but it's better making them in max anyway...

Also what is the use for antiportals?

Antiportals are volumes that hide everything behind them, they are useful to optimize open areas that can't be zoned.
It's covered in AngelMapper's tutorial.

[Hazel.H]

Originally Posted by Vatcilli zeitchef

In JB-Gravity you used a lot of custom meshes.
Do you know a program I can use to make them myself?
The lighting becomes horrible if I make them in ued.

I made all the meshes in ued. The trick is to build the mesh out of very simple brushes - either cubes or the 2d shape editor. You also have to watch the shape of the bsp cuts the brushes make because they can light weirdly. Sometimes I use special lit to get around mesh/mover lighting problems too.

I haven't used this but I heard it's good (and free)
http://www.blender.org
Tutorial

[tarquin]

Originally Posted by Hazel

I made all the meshes in ued. The trick is to build the mesh out of very simple brushes - either cubes or the 2d shape editor. You also have to watch the shape of the bsp cuts the brushes make because they can light weirdly.

The problem with doing that AFAIK is that the meshes you get aren't as efficient:

http://udn.epicgames.com/Two/Convert...esIsSuboptimal

However, while I was looking for that page, I saw it's not really linked from anywhere on UDN any more. So they might have made UEd better at doing it since they wrote that

[G.Lecter]

You can make good meshes with the editor, but I think it's much more difficult, and they will have many more polys...
UnrealEd splits a square/rectangle in 4 triangles AFAIK when you convert brushes to meshes. However with Max or Maya you can manage to split squares in 2 triangles. That means you'll be able to make meshes with about half-less polys than UED.
[Pff... Time to learn Max... ]

[Vatcilli zeitchef]

Where can I get 3d max?
(not too pricy maybe)

[Vatcilli zeitchef]

Originally Posted by Hazel

I made all the meshes in ued. The trick is to build the mesh out of very simple brushes - either cubes or the 2d shape editor. You also have to watch the shape of the bsp cuts the brushes make because they can light weirdly. Sometimes I use special lit to get around mesh/mover lighting problems too.

Hazel please help me on that one. In my map there are two brushes somewhere in the blackness. You can find them easely.
look at them and tell me what I did wrong with them please.

Originally Posted by Hazel

- The textures in the base look low detail imo, you could change the texture scaling to 0.5 or

Oh yeah I scaled the textures down, looks much better thanx.

[Vatcilli zeitchef]

Just picked up work on this one again
I'm afraid I can't do much to scale the bases up If you feel
too cramped you can go to the outside
or in the generator room I'm going to add.
The cramped areas will be exelent for the flak though.
I attached a shot of the room I'm adding now
generator room comming soon.

[Birelli]

Originally Posted by Vatcilli zeitchef

Where can I get 3d max?
(not too pricy maybe)

You can't get Max at anything resembling a decent price, I'd qualify that with something but there really isn't anything else to say, it's just ridiculously priced. I'd recommend Blender myself, I've played around with it a bit, I haven't really gotten the hang of it yet but I don't think I'm any more lost using it than I was with Maya, if that helps. Blender is AFAIK the best free modeling program out there.

Edit: The UWiki: Blender page has some useful information on getting your Blender models into UEd, btw.