PolyObjects

[NokturnuS]

Hi there
Are there any examples out there of working PolyObjects? I manage to create Sliding Doors, Swing, Rotate, move, etc. All of them work fine, but they generate some undesirable effects, like strange lines, holes, HOMS, disappearing walls, etc. (remind me when i nodebuild my maps with DEU 5.1 ... ) when viewing from certain angles. I use Zennode and BSP 5.0 but none changed (better results with zennode tho). Are there any way to fix those horrible effects?

Thanks for your time.

[Lüt]

The best popular example I can think of is Hexen and its expansion Deathkings. I hear polyobjects can only be convex, or at least, will only look good (no bleeding) if they are convex. I don't think you'll ever see any complex shapes in motion in those maps, for that very reason.

[Graf Zahl]

To avoid strange effects it is highly recommended to use a polyobject-aware node builder. AFAIK the only ones so far are glbsp, ZDBSP and maybe DeepBSP. Keep in mind that the current version of ZDBSP has a seg offset bug. This has been fixed but not yet released.

[Quasar]

I doubt poly-aware builders will work with Eternity polyobjects that are created via ExtraData because they're not going to find the Hexen line specials they normally look for.

The things to keep in mind are these:

1) PolyObjects should never touch each other or normal lines. If they do, weird stuff will happen (not crashy stuff, but visual glitches).

2) PolyObjects work best when contained within a convex sector that tightly bounds them. The node builder is less likely to split an area that is already convex. This is mostly important with things such as sliding doors that go back inside the door frame, since if the drawing order of the lines near it is wrong, they'll show through it in some cases.

3) BSP itself has a hack you can use to suggest that it not split specific segs if possible. Joe had some success using this to improve drawing order in some case he never really explained to me in detail.

4) Though Eternity can move PolyObjects between subsectors, the subsectors must have similar properties (flats, light levels, and most importantly, floor/ceiling heights), or weird stuff will happen as the object crosses the boundary.

I hope these tips help.