[?] BF Level Editor

[Element-X_IV]

Hello once again I would like to ask several questions regarding the BF2Editor

I'm working on a couple of maps and am interested in learning about what I could do to help increase performance on my map the best I can. I do not know much else about the editor besides what I can do with it and some of the questions are just out of curiosity and to help myself with problems I can't seem to solve so my apologies if it's somehow stupid.

So here are my questions.

1. Would the poly count and size of an object have a significant effect on performance?

2. Would the amount of unique or different objects have an effect?

3. What is the purpose 'Mesh Memory' in the Level Info tool window of the editor?

4. What are the common causes of crashing when loading maps (related to the map itself)?

5. Would using a different set of textures for objects have an effect?

6. Would having a number of ambient, effects and triggerable objects affect performance?

7. Would the spacing of certain sized objects make any significant change?

8. Why is it that when I test my insurgency map in-game the other team wins right after I spawn?


I also have this one problem if possible please help me.

Whenever I try to lightmap any object they turn pitch black, not sure why. I've replaced lightmapsamples and all that, even after several formats of my PC it's still always pitch black. I've looked it up and it was said to be a shader problem, I also tried that fix and didn't work either.

[Rudd]

1) yes, so plan ahead - enterables should be spaced out with non-enterables between. Don't use statics we have deemed 'bad' because usually its something to do with their optimisation/LODs/whatever.

2) yes and no, the primary concern is texture pallets. e.g. the EA middle east statics all bring their textures from the same texture file, so only one file is loaded and split up to the relevant statics. But if you load an asian building and a middle eastern building, thats 2 textures being loaded.

overgrowth works a bit differently as it piles the relevant textures in to an atlas of its own so that only 1 texture is loaded, however that becomes bigger the more textures you have. (big atlases love crashing maps, dragonfly was a good example)

3) not sure off the top of my head

4) Most crashes will be memory errors (assuming you have packed everything correctly and havent got incorrectly named files) caused by too many/large textures being loaded. - too many lightmapatlases, overgrowthatlas and undergrowth atlas being too large, too many texture pallets being loaded for statics.

5) Unknown however I suspect it does cause problems until the texture is put in to the core PR files.

6) yes, but I think this is mostly a serverside consideration unless it is a constant particle effect, like smoke.

7) not sure what you mean but reference point 1, space out performance intensive statics with less so statics.

I suspect you've made an insurgency map without any caches?...load it up as a AAS to test.



Re lightmapping, your lightmap settings must be screwed up.

go to the editor folder of your map open objectlight and terrainlight

see if they match this

Code: Select all

Terrain settings.

rem ******** lightmap Generation Settings ********
if v_arg1 == BF2Editor

LightMapGeneration.init
LightMapGeneration.GILightsBaseDir 0/0.33/-0.66
LightMapGeneration.GILightsIntensity 0.33
LightMapGeneration.GILightsShadowIntensity 1
LightMapGeneration.GILightsFov 45
LightMapGeneration.UseGITopLight 1
LightMapGeneration.GITopLightIntensity 0.1
LightMapGeneration.GILightsViewDistance 10
LightMapGeneration.skyWhite 0.3
LightMapGeneration.numberOfGILights 8
LightMapGeneration.sunLightShadowIntensity 1
LightMapGeneration.sunLightFov 2
LightMapGeneration.sunLightIntensity 1

endIf



Object settings.

rem ******** lightmap Generation Settings ********
if v_arg1 == BF2Editor

LightMapGeneration.init
LightMapGeneration.GILightsBaseDir 0/0.33/-0.66
LightMapGeneration.GILightsIntensity 0.33
LightMapGeneration.GILightsShadowIntensity 1
LightMapGeneration.GILightsFov 45
LightMapGeneration.UseGITopLight 1
LightMapGeneration.GITopLightIntensity 0.1
LightMapGeneration.GILightsViewDistance 10
LightMapGeneration.skyWhite 0.3
LightMapGeneration.numberOfGILights 8
LightMapGeneration.sunLightShadowIntensity 1
LightMapGeneration.sunLightFov 2
LightMapGeneration.sunLightIntensity 1

endIf

[Element-X_IV]

Alright thanks for the quick response.

I looked at the lightmap files and it appears that they were somehow changed so I did what you said and it worked but when I tried lightmapping a group of statics the debug box started getting flooded with these errors and the editor just crashes.

Code: Select all

Ignored Warning[Ra]  :  Could not find valid technique for the shader: shaders/rashaderstmbasedetaillightmap.fx

Ignored Warning[Ra]  :  Could not find valid technique for the shader: shaders/rashaderstmbasedetaildirtlightmap.fx

Ignored Warning[Ra]  :  Could not find valid technique for the shader: shaders/rashaderstmbasedetaildirtcrackndetailncracklightmap.fx

It's similar to Rhino's problem in this thread from the bfeditor forums.

[Outlawz7]

I'm necroing this topic because I ran into the same issue as in post #3 and bfeditor.org no longer exists, so I can't find a solution. Anyone know the cause/fix?

[Ason]

Same problem as post #3.. Outlawz you found a fix for this?

[Outlawz7]

No, you just have to close the editor and restart every time you lightmap. If you lightmap only selected objects, you can continue doing it by selecting the objects from the list, but your viewport will stay messed up.

It doesn't affect terrain lightmapping, just object, unless you lightmap an object that has no lods but even then it sometimes happens.