Sculpting, routing and lot 'jumpiness'

[SIMplistigal]

I've been working on a world for months (...and months...and months). I'm not a technical person, but I do have a big eye for detail and precision, which gets me into trouble a lot with this program. ;) That being said, I've had to restart or almost restart so many times that I'm about ready to give up, and at this point (just when I started to think I was making some decent headway) I've hit a wall. I've got three different issues going on, but they're closely related, and I'm stuck...

1) Sculpting: I noticed in one of the older threads here that HP posted the problem I've been having--land is sculpted carefully, only to bounce back as though no sculpting had taken place. I've also had the issue where I'll sculpt something, see nothing happen while I do, then suddenly I have this huge peak or sharp, deep valley, despite using low strength, etc. I didn't have these problems at first, but the longer I worked on the world, the bigger a problem it became until now I can't even really sculpt without drastically altering my terrain. And even then it bounces, though not quite back to the original shape. I didn't see anything about this being resolved in that thread, so I'm wondering if a fix has been found? It's driving me nuts!

2) Routing: I thought before that I was done with scupting, and therefore the above REALLY irritating problem. But now I'm checking my routing and finding my sims walking in midair or trudging through solid rock. I've tried using the rebuild routes button, and nothing changes. I'm trying now to go back over all the routing lines to fix them and get them all showing, but it seems that every time I do, I end up with an area that I just fixed getting borked again. And I'm dealing with the sculpting issue as I battle this...

3) To top it off, every time I do the tiniest, itty-bittiest bit of sculpting anywhere in my world, ALL my lots get jumpy. I do have a number of lots that are not flat. I realize this is frowned on/advised against, etc, but frankly, I'm bored with flat lots! :rolleyes: It's not happening just to those curved lots anyway. I have plenty of nice boring flat ones placed all over as well, and those end up out of sync with the rest of the world too. They either notch up a little, or notch down. Admittedly, I have to get low to see the disconnect, but it's there, and it's really annoying. I've placed and re-placed lots several times, and I tried to wait this last time until I was sure I had the terrain just as it needed to be...and then the routing issue reared its ugly head. *sigh*

I'm at my wit's end! Help? :cry:

[auntielynds]

1.) I've had this happen on only one world, my first one last year. It was like after 5 months of manipulating the terrain, the wire mesh wouldn't hold, but that can't happen digitally, right? Well I have not heard of a fix, sorry.

2.) There was a thread about this exact thing about 6 months ago, I cannot remember if there was a resolution......................Found it; http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=436342

3.) In the same world I was talking about earlier, most of my lots were on uneven ground, (I've since repented after spending untold amounts of time and patience trying to fix all those lot tears.) I would suggest to not worry about them until you are ready to export. Sometimes when you first open the world, before you've done anything else, the lots will be seated properly. Check to see if this is the case, then you can export right then, at that perfect moment when the sim universes align, and the sim god is smiling down upon your world. If that doesn't happen, some tears can be camouflaged with foliage, and rocks, and try using the double click on the lot when the move selected button is on instead of the conform edges.

[SIMplistigal]

Thanks for responding, auntielynds, I appreciate it!

1) bah, not the answer I was hoping for, but I guess I have to live with it. I'm glad to hear you've only dealt with it in one world, though. Maybe it's just game wonkiness? :/ I started a few other worlds when I was first getting in to CAW, and don't remember it happening, but I've worked on this one much longer than those!

2) I did see that thread also, but it didn't seem to get resolved, which was why I posted here about it. I do keep my caches clear for the game itself, but hadn't thought to do that in CAW. It sped things up a little, but there wasn't really any change in routing issues. I'm working now on resculpting to make things a little less hilly, and to keep sims from going places I previously allowed. I am really starting to believe that I will never finish this world... *sigh*

3) To clarify, do you mean that when you build lots on flat ground, you never get the jumpy problem ever? (*ready to shake fist at EA*) I loved building on sloped lots in S2... I did notice that some of the smaller breaks did disappear like you said, so thank you for that. At least I don't have to fix *all* of them! I'll try the double click once I finally have my terrain reshaped...again. :P

[auntielynds]

3) To clarify, do you mean that when you build lots on flat ground, you never get the jumpy problem ever?

It still happens, but usually just when I've manipulated the terrain somewhere in the same chunk boundary. If it keeps popping up after I double click, or conform lot edges, I delete the lot, and relay it.

[simsample]

For problems 1 and 3, I noticed these with earlier versions of CAW but the recent versions seem fine, and I'm having no trouble with sculpting after I placed lots (unless of course I'm modifying the area very close to the lot). I don't have any problem with building lots on uneven terrain any more either- the latest CAW versions seem to handle this a lot better.

For problem 2, when the sims walk through solid rock, are they on a road, bridge or just plain ground? Do you have any areas marked sim non routable? Perhaps you could show us some creenshots of your routing map on the affected areas and also a creenshot of the routing mask for that area.

[SIMplistigal]

Simsample, an interesting observation. I did start this world several versions ago. I'll have to see how this goes in a new world I've started working on.

For #2, I've tried attaching some pics. It's mostly shoreline and crests of hills that this is occuring. There's maybe only one or two tiny spots where it happens on a road, a couple spots that it happens in a lot. It's really scattered all over my world though. I think it's happening most often in places that have a slope that's slightly too sharp, but it seems like the game is really picky about what's too sharp. As for nonroutable, I've tried to keep my world fairly accessible, so the only nonroutable I've got is right under bridges (there are several), and on the mountains/little islands that skirt around 3 of the edges. In earlier versions I tried making pathways up the mountainsides, but abandoned most of that when I realized just how high my mountains were... So the nonroutable is pretty simple at this point.

[HystericalParoxysm]

I'm still having problem #1 with the latest version of CAW. It's so intensely, deeply annoying - I'm trying to level a certain area to place a lot so the lot itself is level, and it just won't work. Click and drag and it sculpts, let go and it pops back. I have to place a hill somewhere nearby to get the other terrain to stay - but then if I remove the hill (because I really don't want a hill there), the other terrain pops back to un-level too. I'm getting so frustrated I want to cry.

[simsample]

SIMplistigal- your first image of the shoreline by the bridge just looks normal, but the other two have screwy routing. Can you see in the middle of that field, there are no route nodes (the little circles, where route paths join), and in the last shoreline picture there's an area to the right with the nodes all crunched up together. If there are no objects on the ground then the routing grid should appear regular, with triangular routing paths and evenly spaced nodes. What your images tell me is that you either have something buried under the ground, or else you have some non-routable terrain, or perhaps grouped tree boxes affecting things. I would suggest to look at it in wire frame view to see what's going on, and if you can't figure it out then try backing up your game, then progressively deleting layers until your routing looks right. That way you'll know which layer contains whatever is interfering. For the first picture, do the sims actually sink into the ground, or just their feet? I noticed that on slightly uneven ground they will sometimes have a foot sink into the floor, but never running right through a hill.

HP- is this a world in which you have placed objects and trees? I noticed that if I have large objects, such as the water tower or grouped trees, then this can cause lot sculpting to snap back. Perhaps you could try moving any landmarks, and ungrouping the trees, before sculpting to see if that helps?

[SIMplistigal]

Simsample, what would I be looking for in the wire frame? I honestly have no clue how to use that view, and have generally avoided it. I get what it represents, but that's it... I've changed and flattened out that field area considerably as I was making changes to a couple other things, and this is what I'm left with (see pic). The beach area I showed you is similiar, and now that I know what I'm looking for routing-wise, I've found a few other spots like this as well.

As for #1, I do have several of the river objects in my world. I dare not move them, as they're connected to a crazy number of waterfalls/rapids effects. I have already solemnly promised myself (several times over) never to try for so many waterfalls ever again, no matter how cool it may look... I'd done most of my general sculpting when I placed them, but not the tweaking, so naturally I noticed the issue after they were there. Hard to say if they caused it. I do specifically remember an earlier world I started that had the exact problem HP describes. I had a lighthouse in that world, but I can't remember if I placed it before or after I noticed the problem.

[simsample]

The wireframe is useful for seeing if you have objects buried under ground, but you don't have anything visible in your screenshot. However, there is something definitely very wrong with that area of land bounded by the two black rectangles in the centre. If you look at the bottom of the image you will see that the routing (white lines) are evenly spaced into triangles, with nodes (little white circles) evenly spaced too. That is how it should look on an open area of terrain, with no obstacles in the way. But the area in the centre of the image has gaps, and missing routes, and the nodes are not evenly spaced. A sim will not be able to freely route along there. It's as though there is something in the way, or some reason for the routing to be interrupted.

What I would do is to lightly smooth that area and try rebuilding the routing again, as perhaps that will set it right. Also check there is no non-routing paint there, even a speck. Otherwise, perhaps you could upload your CAW files, and we can take a look to see what's going on.

[SIMplistigal]

ok, so when I tried deleting the different layers, the routing problem actually got much worse. I had huge swatches of my world that had been fine before suddenly turn very poorly routed. It was kinda interesting to see...in a twisted sort of way. :wtf: It seemed to happen most when I deleted the layers that had farm equipment and trees, but it didn't necessarily affect the exact areas those objects were located. The wireframe screenshot actually is with the land having been smoothed out, and there's definitely no nonroutable on it--I tried painting it nonroutable, rebuilding the routing, removing the blue and rebuilding again, but no dice.

I realized I didn't respond to an earlier question: There've only been a couple places where my sims have sunk in deeper than their feet--I'd noticed that they dig into the hills a little, and in places that it bugs me enough, I've been working on smoothing hills or altering them to look and be nonroutable--that first picture is one of those areas, because they sunk in to about the knees as they climbed the hill. More often my sims start running in air, sometimes pretty high, so that's my bigger concern. I do have a couple pathways leading up to nice waterfall views that I'd really like to keep, but when I look closely at the lines, despite having smoothed the path carefully (and growled at problem #1considerably), the lines are above the actual ground surface. My understanding is that the routing lines are supposed to be pretty flush with the ground itself if the sims are going to look like they're walking across it properly--so if the line runs even for a short space under or over the ground, the sims' path is going to look strange. Is this an acurate understanding?

Which CAW files would you need me to upload? I'm such a noob...But I *am* enjoying CAW, and definitely learning a lot from this discussion, so thank you!

[PunkyBreester]

I'm in HP's position. I just got back into the world of the Sims over the past couple of days (hi, everyone! its me, remember?), and I've been playing a lot with CAW. So far its proving very difficult and frustrating will of the glitches I seem to be having :/

[simsample]

SIMplistigal, you would just need to upload the [worldname].world file and the [worldname] folder from Documents \Electronic Arts \The Sims 3 Create A World Tool \UserToolData \Worlds. If you are only getting minor errors then that's okay- you expect a sim to have a foor in the ground occasionally over uneven terrain, after all they are animated to run on a flat surface so it's just a limitation of that. But to run through mountains is not good, and indicates a routing problem.

PunkyBreester, do you have the latest version of CAW? I'm just not seeing the problems HP is describing, perhaps it's because my computer is so old! :lol:
HP had a suggestion from Jasumi here:
http://forum.thesims3.com/jforum/posts/list/402291.page
Which is quite interesting.

[HystericalParoxysm]

I found a decent workaround for the stupid sculpting. It's a dumbass workaround, but, eh, it works. I posted it in the thread Simsample linked but I'll post it here also...

Sculpt the area you want sculpted however you want - this is best done in a small area. It will pop back when you un-click. That's okay.
When you have it how you want, make a small hill nearby. You'll have to make quite a tall one, but when you make it big enough, both it will show -and- the changes you already made.
Save and close your world.
Reopen your world.
Remove the hill and -only- the hill - don't touch any of the area you were actually intending to sculpt nearby or you'll mess it up again.

[SIMplistigal]

HP, thanks for posting in both places. That is a seriously annoying workaround, but at least it DOES work!

Simsample, I think I've actually figured out what's going on with that routing! I was trying out a couple ideas I had, smoothing some ground and deleting a few objects where I was smoothing. This left that particular area free of objects. When I rebuilt the routing to show that, suddenly I had a huge patch of routing ugliness, just like I'd gotten when I'd deleted layers. But placing any road or object through the patch brought it back to normal. So I went into another older world of mine that I'd abandoned, and found myself staring at patches of minimal routing all over the place...essentially in areas where I'd done nothing but shape land. A brand new world that I just started is the same way, except in the areas around the roads I've placed. It seems that proper routing occurs within the distance of 4-6 routing 'squares' from the center of any road or object. Any area that's further away doesn't route properly. This is consistent in all my worlds. Can you confirm it in yours?

[simsample]

Ahh, of course- that will explain why it looks like that, but not why your sims are walking through the floor. :)

[SIMplistigal]

quite right. :) I've been running my simmy all over the areas in my latest version that have that weird routing, and the only time she's sinking in is on slopes that are too much for her to tackle realistically (though the ninja kick-climbing effect on a vertical wall I'd forgotten to mark nonroutable was pretty entertaining! :lol: ). She'll even cross or stand in those areas, however, if she's given a choice how to go through, she generally routes around the edges--and at least in one place, that causes an illusion of floating/sinking as she runs, since those particular edges slope up or down quickly. That area was my big trouble-spot, because of that. Very glad to have that figured out. Thanks for pointing me in the right direction!

I think now that other spots were just due to slopes that were too steep--CAW slopes seem so much gentler and smaller than they really are... :/ I need to find a sim-sized object I can use as I'm making stuffs or something... One time in an earlier test, my sim very visably walked on air, a good couple floors above ground. That hasn't happened in later versions, but it's kinda had me on edge ever since. Especially after reading an older thread or two that talked about making sure *all* of the routing lines are completely visible. Thus when I saw my sims digging into hills deeper than I thought they should as they ran, I thought the routing lines needed fixing. So I'd smooth or otherwise alter ground to let the routing line show up, and another area would go under as I did so. That's what I was frustrated with in my first post, though I don't think I made that clear. Sorry!!

My latest world is a lot smoother, and the pathway I made up the mountainside works great! I felt like I was hiking as I watched my sim. :)

Thanks for sticking with me, simsample! I appreciated your help and comments very much.

[simsample]

I'm glad you have it working well, don't forget to show us some pictures some time! :)