BSP / related engine limits

[ajay]

Though this would be a better place for a discussion started in the "What you're working on" thread.

Background

So close. Finally got to the finishing 'edges' of the map, though not the complete, finished map, and TreeQBSP has gone bang:
ERROR 73: Vertexes in map exceed 65535

That, from what I've read, is fairly fatal now, I'm not sure there's a QBSP that goes beyond that?

I know that some big maps use external bsps to stretch limits.

I've temporarily fixed it using -hilimits, but I've then hit bad surface extents errors, first in light.exe and in running the map.
Fixed again, but I'm not sure I'm going to finish the planned layout/details of the map.

External bsps? Interesting, how does that work?

Another one bites the dust, er, the BSP format. Welcome to the club.

External BSP is exactly what it says, you save part of the map as its own file and compile it, then load it into the main map via a misc_model or similar entity. Much like the old health boxes.

There may be problems with proper lighting of BSP models and so forth.

Has the current quake software reached their limits, or can they be further increased if programmers wanted? TreeQBSP has pushed the limits, as have newer engines - would further limits be possible, or have the Quake formats got limits that can't be extended any further?

Discussion/question

What my final post was (clumsily) asking was can the coders of QBSP .exe 's and engines extend the limits further than they are now (if they'd time/inclination etc) or are we as far as we can go?

Secondly could someone point me in the direction of a map using external bsp's for me to study?

[goldenboy]

Yes, it has reached the end a while ago.

Yes, it can be extended.

No, qbsp / tools people can't fix it, because there are no more tools people in the community (Bengt Jardrup was the last person to specialize in tools afaik). Tools code is apparently hard to understand.

Maps that use external BSP models, I'm not really sure but afair:

e1m2quoth (?)

e1m6rq

probably necros' maps (?)

Maybe ask at func_msgboard if someone can name maps that use external BSP models.

[qbism]

In ne_ruins, type r_drawentities 0.

As far as build tools, LH keeps hmap2 updated. Don't know if provides a solution. hmap2 and txbsp have -subdivide option to increase split polygon sizes and therefore reduce vertices. But requires engine support to know how lightmap scales to larger surfaces (I think that is the reason...).

[metlslime]

hmap2 and txbsp have -subdivide option to increase split polygon sizes and therefore reduce vertices. But requires engine support to know how lightmap scales to larger surfaces (I think that is the reason...).

Yeah, I think the subdivide size needs to stay how it is to support software engines (unless they have been rewritten to support larger surfaces.) Probably because the default max size of 240x240 guarantees the lightmap will be no larger than 16x16.

[ajay]

Out of interest... what are vertexes? I know what vertices are, but....

[goldenboy]

vertexes is the anglicized plural of (Latin) vertex, afaik.

[goldenboy]

Ajay, BSP2 will fix your issues with the limits.

http://mhquake.blogspot.com/2011/09/upd ... -2011.html

[ajay]

*beaming smile* Thanks for the heads up