Maps You've always wanted to see be made official

[Pi_Halo]

Don't get me wrong, I like ac_greenpeace and in the proving ground section of the forum was even the one who suggested it as "an official hopeful". It just simply has some weird lagging issue. On most maps i get around 160-200 fps, a fair amount, but on greenpeace I experience a good 60 fps drop it most places. Even after reducing it to just the map (i.e removing all entries and just having the geometry of the map, the water, and the heightfields) I still see a drop of around 30-40 fps. Which leads me to believe that the geometry of the map, the heightfields, and the water mix together create the fps drop, not the entries. I do believe it can be fixed but at what cost? Would it still be the map that people would want to include? How much of it would have to change to not drop fps as bad? Of course, I am just some lone noob who doesn't know anything about mapping, so don't take my word for it.

EDIT: After doing some research, I have figured it out. It is 100% without a doubt, the water. If I set the value to a very low level, one that isn't shown on the map anywhere, fps improves greatly. I'll leave it to someone else to figure out what makes the fps drop from water so much worse on this map then others. That part is beyond me.

[Undead]

greenpeace suffers from cavern syndrome. I can fix it for a good price

[ExodusS]

for a good price

lol again

[Undead]

je te voulais de parler avec moi francais mais tu m'as rejete et maintenant je suis triste

[Hellspell]

gema_penile_redemption is a genuine contender.

Everyone's saying ac_tripoli but I think the best map shad ever made was his first one which iirc was made in conjunction with a finnish guy who was apparently taking guitar lessons from the guitarist of a famous metal band.

[Pi_Halo]

After doing some research with ac_greenpeace in mind, I have actually came across something. I won't go into much detail on it because its really not needed, at least not in a public topic. However, as most maps in AC started out as a size 8 newmap, I came across an interesting bit. As long as its a newmap size 8 and has a decent amount of water you will see similar fps drops. I checked the value of fps drops due to water on several official maps (like ac_keller and ac_aqueous). The drop value on ac_greenpeace is no worse then most official maps. Though you can greatly increase your fps by turning water settings down, as suspected. I know as of right now, you can't really control water settings per map, but locally person to person. My question is, is there a way for map cfg's to control water settings in the future (i.e turning water reflections off per map load via the cfg)? I feel being able to do something like that, have map loaded water settings, would greatly increase fps on maps with water and wouldn't weigh as heavy on some machines. That is just my opinion on the matter and others might see it different, actually, I am sure some will.

[Mr.Floppy]

Please do not allow anyone but myself to mess around with my client settings, like changing water settings by map's configs. If you happen to experience perfomance drops whenever water is around just change your settings accordingly. No need to dumb down things for everyone. I personally have zero issues with water as long as the map is properly build, even on 'insane' settings.

Secondly, I once read in the code files some odd fact about how water is handled by the engine. In case this hasn't been changed: Water is not taken into account by occlusion culling. Read, if you see one tiny bit of water, the whole water plane which is streched across the entire map, with all reflections and whatnot will be rendered, regardless those portions are in view or not. That's why it is so expensive with the cube engine. Add somewhat proper occlusion culling to the water plane and those massive drops, people are experiencing, will be gone.

[Alien]

Some nice gema map for singleplayer. And shad servers are very popular with his maps, it will not be wrong step.

[Pi_Halo]

I just think something should be done about water, at least in the next release. For some people its not a huge deal, but for others it is. Anytime you are losing 60+ fps due to something, it should have some sort of rework or restricted. There are plenty of maps that this happens on, even in the official packaging. Also I'm sure there are plenty of users who this happens with as well. 60+ fps drop is rather large and I'm sure on some older hardware that number would be even higher as well. I think it is atleast worth checking into fixing if nothing else. Make water levels more enjoyable for all instead of those with just good machines.

[RKTnoob]

water affects wqd, probably the finer the quality of it, the more polygons are used to render it
water will be generated in the smallest possible rectangle across the map, so it covers all possible visible water. so if you have 2 cubes one in each corner of the map, showing water, water will be generated across the whole map. if you have, like in the screenshot above, parts that are in the middle of the map, the water will only be generated between them. I'm not sure how this affects the FPS, but it stands to reason that the smaller the water generated, the faster the map can possibly go regarding FPS. I don't know how the engine actualyl works, but the screenshot above leads me to believe this is how it works. I don't know if generated yet not visible water affects fps and to what degree.
As for water control, I asked around for this some time ago, and there are commands that affect the water wave height and some other attributes. I think it would be good if the mappers could have control over this as an optional command in the cfg, so one could in theory make a map with calm or choppy water or whatnot, and yet, if the command is not used the water will use the client settings, thus enabling older maps (which wouldn't have these commands if they are implemented) not to be affected. It would also be nice to have a check-box in the setting menu to forcibly override the map settings for the water and use the clinet settings, if a user wishes so.

[stef]

Yes, the water is rendered as one rectangle - which is the smallest rectangle all visible water fits in. If you want to keep fps up, keep all visible water close together in a map. IIRC this is even mentioned somewhere in the documentation...

Water settings are not chosen by the mapper but by the player, because the settings depend on the capabilities of the hardware and the preferences of the player. We have quite a few of those settings - and most of them affect the map much more than the water settings (texreduce, anyone?).

We could set up a system so that the mapper could make suggestions towards the water settings - for example, to turn off refraction, if it produces artifacts on a map. But I don't see many mappers using that :)

We have waterlevel and watercolour, which are saved with the map. Then we have waterreflect, waterrefract and watersubdiv, which can not be changed by the map, because they influence the fps impact of water.

What exactly would you like to change? Now would be a good time to ask, since I'm just finishing up map format 10 :)

(better reply here: http://forum.cubers.net/thread-8242.html)

[RKTnoob]

water settings aren't controlled by the mapper but by the player aye, well, except the waterlevel and watercolor.
I would suggest all setting like this should be controlled by the mapper, as an optional command in the cfg, so if there is a command that sets the water-refraction level the map will use the settings in the cfg. If there is no such command, the map will use the settings defined by the client, and there should be a check box or something in the gfx options menu to alwas use the client settings, even if there is such a command in the cfg.
Thus the mappers can have more control of how their map looks like, the old maps retain compatibility, and the user can still force his options on the map if he wishes to do so.
As for the amount of control, the more the merrier, not just including water, but fog and anything else the engine is capable of.
Just as an example, if a mapper wanted to make a dirty muddy swamp water, he could then turn off the reflections in the water to achieve a better effect.
It's not just water, but fog and shadows too. I'm not sure how many such commands are there in the engine, nor how many are directly applicable to mapping, but I would like to have any commands that affect mapping in the cfg, configured as stated above. I'm sure other mappers can add more opinions to this and the developers can help out by listing the things the engine can do or can be configured to do.

Even if it's just being able to resize the water generated area, so some parts below the waterlevel are affectesd by water mechanics, yet some other parts of the map aren't, or better yet, removing the unecessary generated water areas, like the map in question here, could maybe use to help it's fps problems.
Ofcourse, implying that generated not rendered water affects the fps at all.

[stef]

"the more the merrier" - obviously not, because no one will use it anyway, or even know about it. For example, fog and shadowyaw have been in the map config for years...

[RKTnoob]

I think that some other mappers opinions on the subject could prove insightful.

[Mr.Floppy]

Well, this thread has gone quite beyond its intended scope. Maybe another thread (splitting this one?) would be appropriate.

I understand why some mappers ask for more control over client graphic settings and such, since it might open opportunities to circumvent some of the given limits. Though, as I have said already, it is not acceptable to allow mappers to change the users' personal settings in first place. Those methods are most likely going to make things less stable, because no mapper will be able to foresee the actual outcome on all those various clients. After all it's the mappers' job to deal with this boundaries, at least that's my opinion.

Secondly, and particularly regarding water and shadows: As long as we stick with the cube 1 engine, there is little that can be done to enhance the effects without 'reinventing the wheel' and at some point this sort of creativity/freedom some are aiming at, is going to end up in working 'against' the engine. This does happen already.
The only feature I can think of which could be implemented rather easily and would bring great benefit are negative light entities, which then will be effectively shadow entities. There has been a mod around quite some time ago.

[Cemer]

would a hierarchy of water effects be allowed?

ie the effect with less intensity has precedence over one with more intensity

so if a mapper wants reflections on, but the client has them off; then they are off for that client

but if a mapper has reflections off, its off for clients with or without reflections on

[MykeGregory]

Honestly? .. AC_Chillout by MykeGregory. It was just never good enough!

[Orynge]

ac_B}

[MerCyKiL]

ac_OldeVillage - sick map for  (T)OSOK
Ezjemville - loved since birth
ac_rabins_oasis (or rabins-oasis cant remember, you get what i mean) - sick map for TSURV and TOSOK
(ac_)ApolloAbbey iiirc - just a lovely map with lovely plays

i would come back to this game in a heartbeat if we could play those

[It's L'enmerdeur]

ac_OldeVillage - sick map for  (T)OSOK
Ezjemville - loved since birth
ac_rabins_oasis (or rabins-oasis cant remember, you get what i mean) - sick map for TSURV and TOSOK
(ac_)ApolloAbbey iiirc - just a lovely map with lovely plays

i would come back to this game in a heartbeat if we could play those

Fixed for 1.2!
-New link; The tunnels under the sea were broken :c
But damn, it's really a laggy map

[Marti]

Fixed for 1.2

luvvvv