Ahhh OK
Yeah, I was thinking that Ol Bastard'O knew of some horrid results or something... so I tried all sorts of stuff expecting problems.
And maybe I should explain that the ones I moved along the wall only got moved along the direction of the wall. I never tried to pull one out an odd direction that would force the face to have a kink or bend to it. But lets say you have a door cut out in the wall and you later decide you want that door 5 feet over to the left.... well, you can grab the vertices (one at a time, unless someone knows how to grab mulitples at a time... hint hint) and shift them along the wall to the new location. I did not have to merge them again, it kept the solid face information.
Another thing... I did experience some problems when textures did not have the same alignment as you had said I would. The first time I did it, the textures already had been aligned, so it worked without a hitch and I figured that alignment was not an issue, I was wrong.
I also found a process to this merge deal (I love process documentation, it fits my overly logic mind, HAHA, proof that engineers ARE in fact geeks). Anyway, These are the steps and everything works perfect most every time... so far anyway.
A. Build the geometry in Autocad or MAX. Size does NOT matter, I have worked with 2342x956 unit buildings with NO problem. The key is that the units must be to the left of the decimal point, just keep it all on grid and your OK.
B. Export it out as a DXF, this works better coming from MAX than it does Autocad, proof that all DXF filter are NOT all the same (even when they are from the same company). I build in Autocad sometimes and then dump it into MAX, then I go out DXF to the UED.
C. Import it into UnrealEd as a brush and do an add/subtract, whatever.
D. I also found that if you replace the default texture on the brush with one that shows the alignment better, it is much easier to ensure that you get it aligned right. In the "Alignment" section of the "Surface Properties" dialog box you have the 4 options:
1. Align To Floor
2. Wall Direction
3. Wall Pan
4. Unalign
Simply using the first 2 options did not get it aligned right, and I found that if I selected 1, 2 and then 3 that it worked perfect.
E. Rebuild so that the engine will recalculate the new alignment scheme.
F. THEN do the Merge Polys.
Yeah I know, it seems like a lot of steps to take but it goes real fast once you have done it say... a couple... million times.
Also, I have yet to have ONE single BSP problem when I do it this way... not ONE! And the poly count is low compared to importing geometry from Autocad or MAX and doing nothing more than dropping it in and textureing it.
WOW!! *Looks back up at all he writes and thinks... damn, maybe I should have just done an online tutorial on Spoogers Place!*
Yeah I have some new texture packs coming out Bastard'O, but it's going to have textures much like the bank map had, more rich and less grungy.
You know... I would consider doing textures for Infiltration... just that no one has ever asked.
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