BSP vs Static Mesh (again)

Development World Creation
1

Im using BSP just for floors and walls, and complementing them with (a lot more complex geometrically speaking) static meshes made in other packages (3d-coat, 3ds )
I can made rooms really fast with them (bsp) the UV’s are always simple to adjust (maninly scaling), I can make holes wherever I want, no problem UV’s are still there :slight_smile:

However I have read that they are not competitive with static mesh, let’s say a bsp box, it takes more cpu/gpu when compared to a static mesh box, it’s that true? is that much the difference (mainly in the era of GTX 970’s and above cards)?

Thanks.

Edit: I have searched and read previous posts about this, it’s just that I want to make sure is still now that relevant: the (supposedly) performance advantage.

2

I think it’s still the same. Static meshes are better than BSP brushes when you want a good performance. With the geometry tool 2.0 this will probably change :slight_smile:

3

I completely stopped using BSP brushes.
I prototype everything with some Blueprints that behave like “brushes”.
See here: https://forums.unrealengine/showthread.php?74914-Default-Wall-Size

Mostly I saw issues with BSPs when you have a lot of them. It starts out nice and easy, but then you get to a point where thedditor lags severly when you move/add a brush.
With my meshes, this never happens…

4

so the main trouble is performance in editor when they are about 500 or more (?)
“geometry tool 2.0” sounds interesting, when it will be ready? will be part of the engine/editor or a separate package/plugin?

5

I think it will be an included feature of the engine. In the section “tools” you can vote for it (BSP replacement, geo 2.0): :slight_smile:

6

thanks, Im still wondering if in-game the performance difference is marginal and just in editor mode is a problem?

7

With my hardware setup, in my case, yes.

I guess the main performance hit, compared to a static mesh, is the fact that brushes need to be triangulated on the fly during rendering.
A static mesh has its geometry and it never needs to change, (Im not talking about displacement mapping, etc.).
The advantage is the flexibility of non-destructive CSG operations.
But it somehow doesnt outweigh the disadvantages of it.

Here is one of my ancient posts when I still dealt with BSP brushes: https://forums.unrealengine/showthread.php?30372-Lightmap-issue-with-static-meshes&highlight=folder+brush
This was actually the use case for me to abandon brushes. Since then I use meshes for prototyping :slight_smile:
(Although people were asking “With plain cubes like these, I don’t really understand why you don’t simply use CSG, though.”)
Well, performance is the answer :slight_smile: