Quote from Paradoxic R3mix on May 22, 2012, 9:29 am

Well, I don't have much time or access to hammer right now, but i'll edit this later. You can use func_physboxes, and have the start asleep flagged on. Then just name the physboxes, and create a trigger that wakes the func_physboxes up or something. Sorry I have to go. I hope I helped.

Quote from josepezdj on May 22, 2012, 11:22 am

First of all I would like you to clarify what do you exactly mean by "stairs that collapse as soon as you walk onto them"... Do you mean that you need them not to collapse with anything unless the player begin to touch them? or you need them to simply collapse right from the beginning, as map is spawn?

In the first case just make func_brushes (named ofc) that starts "disable" and textured with the "player clip" texture, make at least one for all the steps with a shape similar to a ramp, and 2 for the handrails (from top to bottom) also inclined (following the shape of the handrails). Then enable them/disable them by triggers.
If you fear that also any physic object (cubes for example) could be around, you should also duplicate the above brushes turning them "func_clip_physics" in order to avoid physic objects to get through and texture them for example with the trigger texture, or invisible texture. Ofc also set these "disable" for triggering them later the same as the others.

(some others simply use the "clip" texture and have only one group of brushes that collapse with both: player and phhysic objects... but I always have problems with that to work! and that's why I use 2 rgoups of brushes, one for the player and other for physic objects )

If you don't really mind that your stair collapse from the very beginning, simply do as above but avoiding the "start disable" flag and saving the triggers

Quote from El Farmerino on May 22, 2012, 2:02 pm

@josepezdj - One thing I always wondered - what's to stop you just using invisible instead of the two clip textures? Is that more expensive?

Quote from Jimmy on May 22, 2012, 2:32 pm

First of all thanks to everyone who answered.

@josepezdj
I want stairs in a map. As soon as you walk on them, they collapse and you can't go that way any more. I thought I had seen something like that in the single player game.
As I said I'm fairly new to Hammer still. Wouldn't I need some kind of stairs that would actually allow me to "take them apart"? Like an animation? You write about func_brushes but I don't even know what stairs I'd have to use for that.

I have another thing I want to ask if you don't mind as I don't want to use another thread.
I sent my map (compiled in Hammer) to a friend to test and he has several graphics issues (mainly in a slime pit). Am I doing something wrong? I just gave him the .bsp file.

Quote from Lpfreaky90 on May 22, 2012, 3:13 pm

If you're new to mapping I would urge you to reconsider this idea.

There are no models of stairs that collapse in portal 2, maybe there are stairs that move so you can no longer access them, but no collapsing stuff. Only collapsing walkways. You could use brushes to create a flight of stairs, but that's quite a lot of work and most of the time it won't look that good.

You could also parent it to something like a func_door rotating, but I don't know if that gives the desired effect either. If you're new to hammer it might be better to stick with the default stuff first before going into all other, more complex stuff.

about the slimepit issue: that's probably a lack of cubemaps look at the valve developers wiki for env_cubemap

Quote from Jimmy on May 22, 2012, 3:19 pm

Thanks Ipfreaky90..
Alright, I think I won't do the stairs then.

Quote:

about the slimepit issue: that's probably a lack of cubemaps look at the valve developers wiki for env_cubemap

That's what I thought too, but why would it work when I play the map?

Quote from FelixGriffin on May 22, 2012, 4:30 pm

If you have any other source games with breaking/falling/whatever stairs, or even planks, you could copy those in.

You could also use the breaking ladders from Portal 1's escape sequence.

Quote from josepezdj on May 22, 2012, 4:35 pm

@Jimmy: Dude I'm ashamed... If you read carefully my answer I was always talking about colliding... somehow I never understood collapse!! Damn, I'm a bit so tired lately!

For doing so, listen to Paradoxic R3mix, that has to be done by func_physboxes...

El Farmerino wrote:

@josepezdj - One thing I always wondered - what's to stop you just using invisible instead of the two clip textures? Is that more expensive?

Well El, I don't really know if any tool texture is more expensive than other, anyway I was talking of the func_clip_physics, and that is a func_brush... you can use whatever texture on it as long as it's "not visble": you can use the clip texture (not player clip again), invisible or trigger. I use one of those usually.

Quote from HMW on May 22, 2012, 4:36 pm

About the water thing: your friend may have different (lower) video quality settings. On certain settings, all water textures in custom maps show up like this. You can get it to happen yourself too: just type "gpu_level 1" in the console.

background info
[spoiler]All official Valve maps have something called a "simple world model". This is literally a model, shaped like the map. On lower video settings it is shown in water reflections instead of the map geometry, because it takes less GPU power to draw.

There is a console command called "buildmodelforworld" that is supposed to generate this world model for your map, in the same way that cube maps are built. However I have never gotten it to work properly. It exports a set of .smd and .tga files (source files to build the model and texture) but it doesn't seem to compile them into the final model. This may be something specific with my setup, so you may want to try it anyway and see if it does anything.[/spoiler]