Weird VIS breakage problem!

[Patrick_H]

I've got a weird problem that materialized in my map after I did nothing but changed some entity light values and a few textures. When I stand in an exact location on my map, three closed doors (which happen to be closed area portals) a long ways ahead of me blink out- VANISH- and suddenly I can see through those areas clear through to the other side of the map. With r_showtris 1,I can see here that the map is being completely drawn and the area portals are not present when I stand in this one tiny spot, causing a hiccup in my FPS, since it is already a bit bloated.

 

Any ideas?

 

Screen follows:

 

[Leslie Judge]

As I can see you are standing in a doorframe. Is there a door too with area portal? Just ask, because if you are standing in an area portal brush, doors (and maybe other entities) are not drawn - as you described.

 

If this is your problem, then you could try q3map2's feature. If you compile with q3map2 it is enough to cover only one side of the area portal brush with system/areaportal. All the other 5 can be covered with common/skip. This common/skip comes with q3map2 in the common_extra.shader file which you have to put into your base/shaders directory and place its name in shaderlist.txt.

 

If you still use sof2map then try thinning the areaportal brush.

[Patrick_H]

It's just odd that it started this behavior out of the blue!

[Eldritch]

Probably goes without saying, but make sure that any exits/entrances to the rooms with the door(s) have area portals (or are sealed), otherwise the portals don't work properly.

 

That might've been a little confusing, so I'll give an example.

 

If you've got a door next to a window (and the window looks out on the area the door leads to) an area portal won't stop that section from being drawn 'cause you can see through the window. The engine doesn't really make distinctions, so if there's any other way the next area could be seen from that room, the area portal won't work. Savvy?

 

I hope that was a bit clearer.

[Patrick_H]

I actually do understand the "enclosed area" concept behind area portals. I assume it is used to close off complex areas from other areas so the map isn't being entirely drawn at all times and dragging down framerates.

 

Well, the problem was definitely related to the area portals. I found a thread on another forum where someone else had the same problem in their Q3 map.

 

Q3map2's author, ydnar, told them to put the area portal texture on only one face of the brush, and to place the hint texture on the other 5 sides. This solved the problem!