Quick, cheap terrain:

Level of difficulty= Moderate (Practice the basics first, learn some of the useful key shortcuts)

+It is ideal to have started with a new world file, but if you want to add to an existing map, work on terrain on another file, then carefully copy and paste your work to the other file.

•Make a new triangular plane in the +y direction to start.
•Now make another one.
•Rotate that one sideways so that both triangles make a square when moved together.
+180deg rotation using overhead view will get it done
•Make sure they are in the same level in the y (vertical) direction.
•Copy both triangles and paste them right next to them to form a rectangle.

•Continue cloning these until you get about the terrain you need.
+More triangles = more detail = less chance of making mysterious holes
+Since you'll be stretching stuff, it is a good idea to make a bit more than you need.

•Join the brushes (your triangles) by pressing SHIFT+J. (You can undo this by pressing CTRL+J).

=Now the hard part:
•Switch to Geometry edit mode (with all the triangles selected)

•Carefully use Right Mouse Button Hold to 'stretch' the vertices:
+Be systematic; take a row at a time
•Use a vertical view you're comfortable with
•Look for a vertex
•Highlight a vertex by moving over it with cursor
•Hold Right Mouse Button and move the mouse, let go where you want it
+Try not to cross squares into other ones
+You can also move vertices using the V key- hold V and move mouse (might help in some situations)

+Another cool feature of DEDIT is that you can select a group of vertices and move them together using S + Mouse Movement when you have a selection with many vertices (Ex: You got a water-filled moat on the same terrain for a castle, so you select a square area near the center to make a flat surface for the castle- Move vertexes vertically)


+Don't over stretch, can or might leave invisible holes
+If stretching gets weird with the texture (texture stretched at a faster speed), then try again, or try another vert
+Stretch every other square, don't stretch adjacent squares
•Test the terrain by walking and jumping all around it
•The rest is luck and patience (get a soda and focus!)
Good Luck!

thats sooo cool neo...
i might get back to mapping now...just cuz that tip might make stuff more intersting

its not the right method to build terrain in dedit.... btw theres many ways to do it, but this way will consume too much time and ull will give up before complete your terrain....

theres a prefab in Siberia/terrain folder which is a plane, all u have to do is disconnect it (right click in any viewport/disconnect selected prefabs), than duplicate it (copy/paste), place it near the other part and join them (select both parts/ shift+J)

start small to build a big terrain/ its a good idea move some vertex a little bit down/up to make your terrain looks realistic/ so do this 1st before copy and paste parts, it safe a lot of time

mountains can be created and placed around the terrain by copying a part of the horizontal terrain and rotating it to the vertical position (select the brush,ctrl + left/right arrows in any side viewports)

in the screenshot posted by Neo u can see lots of polygons that players will not see.... u dont need them there and they will consume the memory and processor so its better than do this that Neo said because u wont have to disconnect all the terrain and select many specific triangles to change its texture....
it saves lots of time again....

about making a lake, dont select all those vertex, it ull makes u crazy lol
its easy if u just use a prefabed terrain (a small part of it to resize) from siberia folder (a plane) put it near your terrain, join the vertex in both sideviews, and just move the vertex gradual to make a realistic natural pool... start from outside to the middle (where is more deeper)

doing this u wont have to select triangle by triangle to change its texture (and will make its a lot easier than grab a lots of vertex, which is confusing and useless if u can have the same result with a small part which helps the engine)

terrain lightness must be gouraud (its not a good idea sets it to lightmap, gouraud makes an irregular surface smooter than lightmap and saves a lot of memory too)

usefull keys:

M key + right click = M is used to grab a vertex in geo edit mode/ u can move the vertex by pressing right mouse click

CTRL + J = disconect brushes
Shift + J = join brushes (polygons)

"right method"? Mapping is an art, I don't believe in a "right method"...
Oh and btw, it's not my method exactly, I got the idea from another forum, I just figured out the missing details, added some tips, and took some screenshots.

Actually, all those screenshots were made to show how those steps work.
It's for cases that are much different than just plain terrain.
What I really was doing is, a castle surrounded by dynamic/reflective water.

I wanted to make a level top, but yes, those extra polies will lag it up, though you can easily erase those unneeded polies by selecting the whole, then switch to vertex edit, then point (rollover) the polies you want out and press Delete.
Or, even better, start with a rectangular plane in the middle where the building goes, but do not modify the vertices on the edges of that rectangle (you'll make the triangles around thie rectangle). Later, delete that rectangle if a building is sitting on it.

Also, you can change the basic form of the triangles by using the overhead view and deforming the vertices by using the V key.
Here's what I was doing (still in progress, just a rough idea):



So yes, piecing together pre-made terrain is good too, there's many ways to make terrain. I say, use the way described at the top for small stuff such as soil for a planter and for generic terrain use koyasha's way.

hmmmm... yes theres ways and ways to build a terrain... since we dont have a plugin exporter for Maya 6.0 (only for an old version of it) we cant make big things for NOLF2,



in this map i used my method to build the terrain, u can see the pool, which is small (works for a big lake too... has no difference) and doesnt need many polygons (was build separately from the terrain, jut selecting some triangles from the sand terrain to work with it separately which is much more easy than start picking lots of vertex...thats why theres a key to hide the geometry u dont need...)... also the rocks around the map has 1 side only, not 2 parts like in your tutorial, so before build a terrain using your method remember that Jupiter Engine cant handle too much polygons in the screen, and all those behind the rocks are useless since the players will not see them



i did the same thing to build the mountains and all the geometry in this map (its still in the works)... in Neo's method would be insane select polygon to polygon than join and texturize so its a better idea work with the parts separately



the snow part is a prefabed plane terrain i used (1st i rotated it as a prefab, than later disconected it and changed its geometry using Geo Tool...)


btw Monolith made all the NOLF2 and CJ terrain in Maya and 3D MAX... dedit isnt the best tool for it...

and your map looks awesome keeps the great work! cant wait to play it!!!

Thanks, it's gonna be a more or less completely destructible structure and there'll be a mine field in the middle (nice of developers to add that feature in DEdit).

Actually, it's not rendering the back of each poly, they are all single-sided since the process begins with planes with a surface only in the positive vertical direction in this case (positive y-axis). All the edges were raised up-my fault for moving them in the first place-but nothing is hidden from a player's view (except under the building which can be erased in a couple of quick moves).
Still, it can get laggy in large quantities (so far no lag at all on my map, but I got a fast computer lol). So yeah, save my method for other cases...

Ok, so I looked at one of the pre-fabs (Antarctica terrain), they seem to use the triangle method at first, then really deform the triangles, then it looks nice when raising/lowering some parts of it...So, for those who are starting to use DEdit, use that method (as Koyasha describes) and use the keyboard shortcuts mentioned all over this thread to speed up the process where possible/needed. Just be careful when piecing together those parts. But to make terrain as seen on my screenshots, it might work to stretch-up every other poly where the level (flat) area is going to be. There's more to it, but once the mapper sees what the different keys do, there's nothing to it but to do it.

I didn't know they made that stuff in 3d max. Cool, I might need to use that for a school project later on, so I guess I'll try it with nolf.

dang koyahsa...r we ever gonna see those maps?...they look awesome...

and neo...ur map loox sweet too...i want to play new maps

LOl, there's moon for ya, bustin on in to tell ya that somethin isn't right if its not her way well, neo has helped me soo much in DEdit and i owe him so much thx a bunch

Maybe it's a good idea to make some prefabbed terrains available for other mappers? So they can just add it, change it a little and go from there?

If i'm not mistaken, they do already, but they suck

There are one or two available, yes. But I mean some stuff by us. Stuff that doesn't suck.

i can share my terrains with you, just add me to msn sfi_koyasha@msn.com

i build my terrains separately, so using the different parts you can use your imagination to make your own


WR Factor.... DM Desert Oasis was available to download at The Site that shall not be NAMED!!...

u can have the map asking to friends or adding me to msn

DD Cable Car Station is still in works and it will be release soon as possible...

o...than that means i have the desert oasis than...i just havnt played the DM custom maps...but i got the mappacks...so it should be in it...

but cable car station...cant wait!...and its DD
woot!

usefull keys:

use "B" to grab a vertex in geo edit mode/ u can move the vertex by highlighting it (you know make it yellow not green) and moving the mouse ...
if a vertex is "off the grid" and u want to attach another vertex to it use "B" it will
snap to the vertex thats off the grid ...if u want to stay on grid then "m" works

put your marker on the center of your map\room etc. press "L" and move your mouse around you can see all around easy

somebody told me that 1 thought i share it