Nav problems: read this shit

[Dr.Boo]

Nipper, I got some info about the nav problems you're having through the mailing list. I presented the problems you had through the list yesterday. Perhaps it's of any help.
I put my comments in blue bold between [brackets]

Dr. Boo, are you saying your friend Nipper can't generate an escape route, but you can? [he's talking about my jungle map and the answer is yes] Also, did he verify that the bots can go from beginning to end with or without an escape route? [sometimes they follow you and sometimes they dont is that it? When they do follow you till the end, did you see them teleport to get to you?] If they can then maybe he's run into the same thing Glen and I have. [the bots followed them fine without having to teleport and went into the saferoom with them, but they still get the flow error]

Glen [talking to the other guys who had the problem], you said that level you got working might end up being the first, and only, one in the campaign? I just checked all the official decompiled maps and found no landmark in the start area of the first map in each campaign. I also tested this myself and confirmed the landmark in the spawn area of the first map isn't needed. This makes sense with my understanding that the landmark is supposed to save survivor positions relative to it and put them in the spot they were at in the previous level. All official maps, for both l4d1 and 2 (decompiled) have info_survivor_positions for each character in the first map only of each campaign, which reinforces the idea that the info_landmark isn't necessary in the 1st level spawn area.[sounds logical indeed but not really relevant to your problem since your first map works fine right?]

How many levels are there in your campaign, Dr. Boo? If yours is level 4, I'd guess you're using CHECKPOINT and CHECKPOINT [yep and it weems to work fine] or CHECKPOINT and FINALE. Regardless, Nipper's most likely using CHECKPOINT and CHECKPOINT for both start and end areas in maps 2 and 3, correct? [I guess so?]

I know that running my first and only map through hammer or through console failed to generate an escape route no matter what I put in it. There are lots of factors involved though. Maybe see what kind of change level trigger he's using? [they mentioned something about a difference between info_changelevel and trigger_changelevel. Which one do you have on your maps?] I have yet to verify if nav_analyze takes it into consideration when generating an escape route. I'd hope not. Could you get his nav_analyze and nav_trouble reports and post them here? [if you can give me this, they might be able to help] It'd be nice to take all these things into consideration before I jump into bug hunting.

About that FINALE and CHECKPOINT thing, this was said but I don't know if it helps you.

Just to clarify it seems that what made the most difference in successfully
generating a nav was marking the tile in my spawn area as CHECKPOINT and my
ending saferoom as FINALE?

In your case, since you test your map with the "map" command, the game might see it as a standalone map. And for standalone maps it seems like you need to use that FINALE attribute. You could try and change the tiles in your ending saferooms to FINALE and see if your problems are solved if you test your map as standalone thourgh the "map" command. If it works, you can rechange it back to CHECKPOINT once the map is "integrated" in the campaign.
This is why I asked you if you used the "map" command to test your maps yesterday

[NIPPER]

they mentioned something about a difference between info_changelevel and trigger_changelevel. Which one do you have on your maps?

this could be it, i'm using trigger and I think the error mentions info_changelevel. But my first map works fine... blah

i'm betting it's just nav_blockers and stuff, plus the way the haunts layout sorta wraps around itself.

edit: tried info_changelevel - doesn't do anything

I'm done for now I'll try again sometime but for now this isn't coming out any time soon.

[Dr.Boo]

Perhaps you can send me one of the maps + it's nav so I can check it out? Who knows... I might find something.

[Dr.Boo]

Ok, I checked your nav+map and I posted the nav_analyze output and the nav_trouble_report to the guys in the mailing list. I only did Moria so far
Some shit I noticed:

- You have a lot of orphan areas. Meaning these areas are not connected to the main path. I fixed those by connecting them. Some of them were under displacements (where nothing is supposed to go) and I did away with those.

- You seem to have a few unconnected ladders. Now, AFAIK, there are no ladders critical to the survivors progress through the map BUT what about the infected-only paths that go around the closed doors? Are there any ladders on those "auxiliary" paths? If so, I'll have to check those. Problem is, the trouble report doesn't higlight them so it's a pain to find the incorrect one

- When I crossed the great hall, I could hear the "horde chime" every 5 seconds but no hordes rushed at me. Is this normal? Did you set something up there to make several hordes? This might get fixed by itself if we sort out the flow shit though.

- The bots are dumb fucks. I dunno if this is due to the flow error or due to the fact that bots are fucking enthousiastic about killing Tanks. But at the end, the bots seem not to come to the saferoom and instead, they keep on killing the Tanks that get spawned after the previous one dies.
Perhaps it could be a good idea to kill the trigger that spawns that endless stream of Tanks once the bridge collapsed?

- Something minor: the music at the start of your map is the campaign start music. You know... the music you hear at the start of a campaign where the camera pans around before transferring control of the survivors to you. This can be changed in Map Properties where you change Mission Start to Map Start or something like that.

I'm gonna try a few suggestions that Hans from the mailing has suggested. These guys are really nice because they really wanna help if they can.
One guy named John even said he was willing to take a look at the maps and the navs and fix them (he said he did it in the past for other people). But obviously, I won't give anything without your permission

[Dr.Boo]

For Moria, I had these suggestions from the guy of the mailing list:

Ok, I really think it has something to do with those barricades that only break once a certain condition is met (ie, tank is dead).

So I turned on: z_show_flow_distance 1

This gave me the dreaded -9999/-9999 numbers up until the wooden barricade, where at the nav_tile marked door you can see the flow numbers start. Not sure if the fact the numbers seem to start from the end safe_room is another possible issue to keep in mind or not. For kicks I let this wooden barricade break, deleted the nav tiles around that area and incrementally regenerated the nav with the wooden door barricade gone and this successfully continued the flow numbers. I followed the flow all the way back to, you guessed it, the barricade that is blocking the well room.

Odd, since on L4D1 it didn't seem to have a problem. You could try and add an infected-only path to that last door before the endless stream of Tanks. In the meanwhile, I'm waiting for more advice on how to deal with this problem without ditching the barricades on Moria.
It's probably the same problem that causes this shit on Haunts.

PS: I fixed all errors reported in the nav_trouble_report. Didn't fix the flow problem, but you needn't worry about those any more

[NIPPER]

cool thanks.

I'm almost positive it has something to do with the way my nav_blockers are set up

[Dr.Boo]

cool thanks.

I'm almost positive it has something to do with the way my nav_blockers are set up

I think the way nav_blockers work and must be used has just changed since L4D1. Because you most certainly are not the only one who has these nav-nightmares.

[Dr.Boo]

I've got some good news and some bad news.
Lets start with the good news: I made a small map with a similar setup to the one of Moria: there is a locked door that the survivors have to go through in order to proceed to the saferoom. The door will only open if you press a button right next to it.
Here is what I did for the nav:
- Generate a complete nav, marked starting and ending saferoom as CHECKPOINT.
- The nav generation would not connect the tiles in front of the door to the ones behind it. That seems logical to me since the door blocks you
- I pressed the button and the door opened. I generated some nav tiles between between the tiles that were in front and the ones behind the door so both connect correctly.
- nav_analyzed and restarted the map
- No errors, no flow problems, perfect generation of an escape route even though the door was obviously closed again. I ran up to the door with the bots following me and they didn't try to "run into it" they just stood there waiting for me to open the door.
- I pressed the button, door opens, proceeded towards the saferoom. All bots followed me without probs, without teleportation and the level ended.
-Restarted the map, suicided to see if when the map restarts I'd get the "Map is unplayable" error you (Nipper) had with the very first L4D1 version of the campaign. But I didn't have any error.

Then, I duplicated the map and made one change: added a nav_blocker to the door.
- A logic_auto sends the NavBlock output to the nav_blocker as soon as the map starts.
- The door's button sends an output UnBlockNav to the nav_blocker as soon as it's pressed.

Guess what! I had the same flow error you're having now. Couldn't generate an escape route and got the fucking -9999/-9999 error tiles, even after opening the door. Bots won't follow me inside the saferoom. Basically, the same problem ytou're having now. I tried this with "Affect flow?" on Yes.
Then, I edited the map and simply set the "Affect flow?" crap to No, recompiled and the flow worked fine! I didn't even have to regenerate whatever.

Well, that's the GOOD news. The bad news is that tomorrow it's monday and I hate mondays. Also, I don't know what effect it would have if you removed the nav_blockers on YOUR maps or if you'd set the "Affect flow?" thingies to No. All I know, is that in my testmap it worked fine. So I'm unsure if that's the solution to all your nav problems, but it might be worth trying no?

PS: if you want the VMF files of the testmaps + their navs for any reason, let me know and I'll zip them and give them to you. I just hope it will work for you too...

PS: I sent this problem to Phil Co too and he replied this:

Hey, Alexis,

Sorry it took me a while to get back to you. We're trying to ship our DLC soon

Anyway, I'll try to help you sort this out. For one, infected need to get to the survivors from the end of the map to the beginning. Do you have ways for the infected to get past the door coming from behind it? We usually have PZ ladders and climb up connections and drop downs any time we have a gate or some kind. Also, in the Dark Carnival map we use func_brushes with the clip material on it across that whole gate while the func_nav_blocker is set to block nav. [I checked this map, the nav_blocker has it's "Affect Flow?" thing set to No] Maybe you could try this since most of our doors in L4D are supposed to be breakable. Not sure if that would help.

Other than that, I think I'd need to take a look at the map and nav files.

Phil

I hope this load of info helps you, Nipper. let me know if you need any further attention. It seems Phil is even willing to check it out himself but I suggest we try to solve it ourselves first so we don't have to bother him with checking a whole map